A DREAM WALKING
By Bernie Silver
I'm a semiretired reporter and editor who in my dotage has turned to part-time caregiving and fiction-writing, not necessarily in that order.
Randall Setler sat in the cloistered darkness of the Rialto movie theater fantasizing what it would be like with her, "with" being a euphemism for you-know-what, "her" being Irene Wyler, the beautiful—make that stunningly beautiful—star of the film he was watching.
Heaven-Sent had garnered no accolades and surely would win no awards, for like most of Ms. Wyler's two-dozen films, all of which Randall had seen at least twice, the movie was singularly unremarkable except for her.
But she was enough.
Enough to raise the hopes of many, if not most, women that they too might someday become strong and independent, yet remain kind, sensitive and understanding, and, as a bonus, mate with a good and honorable man.
As for men, Ms. Wyler triggered their fantasies of someday bedding a drop-dead, out-of-this-world, pulchritudinous woman.
Which might explain (note the modal auxiliary) the train of events that began midway through that night's Rialto screening of Heaven-Sent. One minute Ms. Wyler was
enjoying a glass of wine with one of her many lovers, and the next she appeared to be scanning the audience. Then, stretching plausibility even further, she popped out of the screen, descended the stage on which it resided and strolled down the center aisle, all the while looking directly at Randall Stetler. Upon reaching his row she took the seat next to him.
This can't be happening, he thought. Things like this don't happen in real life. Things like this can't happen in real life. Things like this don't, and can't, happen to me. I must be dreaming. Or fantasizing, as usual.
Just to be sure, Randall pinched his forearm, which hurt, so he must be awake. He almost pinched Ms. Wyler's but managed to refrain. Instead he turned back to the screen.
She was still there.
He glanced to his right, and found her still there too.
He could draw only one conclusion: he must be losing it.
Randall vowed, not for the first time, to stop all this nonsense, this daydreaming and fantasizing. But then the Irene Wyler next to him smiled the smile that had so enchanted him on screen, and that, along with her incomparable beauty, had earned her the lead in countless other men's reveries.
Irene Wyler leaned toward him and whispered, "Don't worry, you're not hallucinating—I'm real." She offered her hand. "Feel."
Randall hesitated. When the actress repeated her request, he gave in and took the proffered hand.
It seemed real enough. He squeezed it just to be sure.
"Ouch," Irene Wyler said. "Not so hard."
"Sorry."
"Well, at least you're convinced now, right?"
Randall remained mute.
"No? Okay, touch me again, only this time anywhere you want." Now the smile turned mischievous.
Still hesitant, Randall laid a hand on her shoulder—bare except for the spaghetti straps of her summery cotton dress.
"I suppose that'll have to do," Irene Wyler said. "Let's call it a start."
Randall removed his hand but said nothing.
"Oh, I get it," Irene Wyler said. "You're the courteous type . . . considerate of other patrons. I like that in a man."
Randall managed a half-smile but continued his silence.
"Okay, let's go someplace where we can talk," Ms. Wyler said. "Or do whatever."
She stood, grabbed his hand and tugged him to his feet. He followed her into the lobby, where she looked as exquisite as ever, even under harsh lighting.
"Where would you like to take me?" Irene Wyler asked.
Randall knew where he'd like to take her, but said, "You hungry?"
"Actresses are always hungry. The price of starvation diets.”
"What kind of food do you like, when you do eat?"
"I like anything and everything. You pick."
"Thai okay?"
This was Randall's favorite, so if nothing else he'd enjoy a good meal during this fantasy.
“It's more than okay," Irene Wyler said.
He chose the Thai House, a cozy eatery within walking distance of the theater.
#
Upon their arrival the actress kissed Randall's cheek, a gesture that felt real enough, then took his arm as they entered the restaurant.
Apparently both hostess and waiter could see her. The former led them to a table for two and the latter gawked a moment before taking her order of tofu and bean sprouts. Reluctantly he turned to Randall, who ordered Pad Thai and, with Irene Wyler's consent, two iced coffees.
The waiter departed and Randall gazed openly at his companion.
"'What're you staring at?" She sounded more curious than annoyed.
"You."
"I know that, but why? Do I look that much different in person than on screen?"
"No, you're breathtaking either way. It's just, I've never seen you in reality, if that's what this is. Which I doubt."
"Thanks for the flattery but what do you mean, 'Which I doubt?'"
"C'mon, this isn't real. It can't be."
"You mean us being here together?"
"Yes."
"Why can't it be real? You felt my hand, my shoulder, my kiss . . . what more do you want?"
"Look, actresses don't just step out of a movie screen and into my life," Randall said. "Now don't get me wrong, this is great. In fact, it's the best dream I ever had. But it's just that, a dream, and I'm pretty sure I'll wake up soon. I just hope it's not too soon."
"Okay, I'll play along," the actress said. "This is a dream, and I too hope you don't wake up prematurely. Because we have something to do."
“What do you mean, "some thing to do? What thing?”
"Please don't play dumb, Randall. It's unworthy of you."
He decided not to question her further. Whatever would come, would come. Admittedly, though, if her idea of something to do coincided with his, he'd finally reached nirvana.
"So what do you do with your time?" Irene Wyler asked. "That is, when you're not picking up women in movie theaters."
"I didn't . . . I . . ."
"Do you know how cute you are when you blush?"
"I . . . no . . . well, I'm a writer."
"A writer? How exciting. What do you write?"
"Fiction. Short stories mainly."
"That's wonderful!"
"Only one of them's been published, in some obscure magazine whose name I can't even remember. And I got paid next to nothing for it."
"But you're doing what you love, right?"
"Yes, there's that. I worked nine-to-five for years, in the PR department of a major tech company. I hated the job but it paid well, and I saved enough to support my writing
habit. At least for a while."
"Good for you. I admire risk-takers."
"Yes, but all those years—"
“Doesn't matter. You're doing what you love, and risking your security to do it. That's admirable . . . and in a way romantic.”
"I never looked at it that way, but I'm glad you do."
"Would you take a risk for me?"
"If you were real I would."
She laughed full out just as the waiter arrived with their coffees. Irene Wyler sipped hers, then surveyed her surroundings. "I like this place . . . it's homey and comfortable." She turned back. "I also like my escort. A lot."
"Who . . . me?"
"Did someone else squire me here?"
"But you don't even know . . . I mean—"
"I know a little about you, and what I know I like. Now it's time to find out more." She cleared her throat in exaggerated fashion. "First off, how old are you?"
"Um . . . does it matter? "
"Coy on the subject, are we? So are most people. And no it doesn't matter. Next question: have you ever been married?"
“Twice. Two flops are standard for someone my age.”
"Now you sound cynical."
"Disappointed would be more like it. I'm not bitter, though. I'm sure my exes were disenchanted with me."
"Well, I'm sorry about your failures. If it's any consolation, I'm not disappointed in you."
"Yet."
"Yes, but I could have been disillusioned by now. I might have found you boring or boorish or self-absorbed or any number of other unlikable things. But I haven't."
"That's nice, but the way it goes with men and women is that, after they've been together awhile, the other shoe falls. Because then they lower their guard and let it all hang out, including their defects. So they split up or get divorced, then go through the process all over again with someone else."
"What a dismal picture. Why don't we take it one step at a time and agree not to get married today."
Randall had to smile.
Just then the waiter delivered their food, gazed longingly at Irene Wyler and left.
She dug in and cleaned her plate before Randall was halfway through his Pad Thai. "As you can see," she said, "I've decided not to starve tonight."
Rather than comment on her meager dinner, Randall switched subjects. "I've been meaning to tell you, I love your work . . . all of it. In addition to . . ."
“In addition to what?” Irene Wyler asked, grinning.
“Well, you know, in addition to your looks.”
“Oh, they're not that much.”
“C'mon, false modesty's not allowed here. You must be aware of how gorgeous you are.”
"Thanks to the makeup and camera people. Amazing what they can achieve."
"Some actresses may need Revlon and fancy camerawork, but I'm sitting right across from you and they have nothing to do with what I see."
"You sure about that? You don't even think I'm real."
"Well, you're not, but within this dream . . . you know what I mean. Right here, right now, you look amazing."
“That good, huh?”
"That good. In fact, as long as I can say anything I want . . ."
Randall hesitated.
"What?" Irene Wyler smiled encouragement.
"Well, I'd give my right arm to sleep with you. No, let me amend that. I'd give my right arm and left leg to sleep with you.”
"Rest assured, you won't have to sacrifice any limbs to do that."
"So you're saying you want to have sex too? With me?"
"Obviously."
"See, that proves this is another one of my fantasies. In real life, it doesn't work that way."
"And just how does it work in real life?"
"Well, usually a guy's gotta date a woman awhile before she'll go to bed with him. And even today, with feminism and all that, she probably won't tell him she wants to have sex. He's gotta read the signals and make sure the timing and room temperature are right, then he has to take the initiative."
"Is that so?"
"It's so. For most of us, anyway."
Irene Wyler sipped her iced coffee while Randall picked at the remainder of his meal. He wondered if anyone could overhear them. No matter; everyone else was a figment too.
"I'm sorry carnal knowledge of a woman has been such an ordeal for you," Irene Wyler said. "But tonight you can relax. I want you and you want me, so we'll both get what we want without a lot of effort."
"I don't understand. Why would you—"
"Do you want understanding or me?"
"No contest."
The waiter appeared and asked if they wanted anything else. Randall shook his head and requested the check.
"Sorry . . . I'm being rude,” he said after the waiter had gone. “You want dessert?"
"Yes, but not here." That smile again.
Eager to depart, Randall left more than enough cash without waiting for change.
#
Their moderately priced hotel room came with the usual trappings: queen-sized bed, chest of drawers, glass-topped table and thirty-inch television. Also a stuffed chair and five-foot floor lamp.
The room had one drawback: its only window overlooked the hotel parking lot.
"Sorry," Randall said, peering out at rows of cars basking in the moonlight.
"What're you apologizing for?" Irene Wyler sat on the bed, bouncing several
times as if to test its strength.
"The view. It's not very scenic."
"I didn't come here for the scenery."
"No, but it would've been nice if—"
"You're nervous," she said.
"It shows, huh?"
"Yes, definitely."
"I get nervous around beautiful women. Always do, probably always will. And now you and I . . . you being the most beautiful woman I ever met . . you and I are about to . . . you know. That makes my jitters doubly embarrassing. You'd think at my age—"
"Why?"
"Why what?"
"Why're you so nervous around beautiful women? They're just flesh and blood."
"That's what they are to other women and some men, I guess. But to guys like me they're the impossible dream. And believe me, the only reason I'm in this room with you is because I'm dreaming."
"You still think this isn't real."
"I know it isn't."
She stood, walked over to him and kissed him lightly on the lips.
"Was that real?"
"Yes . . . no . . . I mean, dreams always feel real when you're having them."
She put her arms around him and kissed him harder.
"Was that real?"
"It felt genuine, but—"
She placed a hand over his mouth. "Hush. What say we go to bed and see what's real and what isn't."
They went, and by dawn's early light Randall believed.
Almost.
#
Irene Wyler exited the shower, dried herself off and wafted back to bed, where Randall Stetler lay staring at the ceiling. She got under the sheets and snuggled next to him. He turned to her, then tried to hide his dismay. He'd seen women without makeup before, of course, but the sight of Irene Wyler's pale, unexceptional face was a shock to his system.
"You can't say I didn't warn you," she said. Then, "Well, now that you've seen this much, you may as well see the rest."
"But I've already—"
"Not with the sun streaming in."
She pulled her portion of the sheet aside, revealing her unclad body, then pointed at the stretch marks.
Seeing them clearly for the first time, Randall said, "You've got kids?"
"One. A son, Daniel."
"Um . . . how old's—"
"Eleven."
"You're not . . . I mean . . ."
"No, I'm not married. Not anymore."
She bent her left knee, the one nearest him, and traced a path along her entire leg, smooth, firm and flawless except for the spider veins decorating it from thigh to ankle.
"Other leg's the same." She displayed it in the same manner. "Courtesy family genes," Irene Wyler said. "My mother and grandmother had even worse cases, if you can imagine it."
Randall remained silent.
"Do my legs bother you?"
"No, of course not. What kind of man would—"
"Oh, you'd be surprised how many men lose their enthusiasm once they see me in the buff."
"The thing I don't understand is how . . . in the movies . . . when, you know, you're in shorts or something . . ."
"The miracle of digital airbrushing. I keep begging them to show all my warts but they just laugh, as if I've said something funny."
"I--
"But thank God you don't mind them, my lovely veined legs."
"I . . . uh . . ."
"Oh good, but there's something else you should see." She turned on her stomach. reached behind her and patted her buttocks.
"They look like prunes, no? Even working out doesn't get rid of the cellulite. You should hear the comments. One guy said . . . well, let's just say men can sometimes be
cruel." She played with Randall's chest hairs. "I'll admit, though, in the light of day I'm a mess."
"No you're not."
Irene Wyler scooched over and brought her face close to his. "You lie." She sounded puckish and solemn at the same time.
Randall turned on his side, facing away from her.
"See, I was right," she said.
He thought he heard a sniffle and turned back. "Are you crying?"
"No, just acting." She looked at him with watery eyes.
"I mean it," he said. "What's the matter?"
"I'm sorry. It's just that I thought you'd be the one."
"The one what?"
"Don't worry. You'll be fine . . . for someone."
"But not for you."
"I'm afraid not."
"What'd I do wrong?"
"Nothing, really. You did what men do."
“I don't understand.”
“You will someday. Maybe.”
For some reason, Randall felt incredibly sad. Gathering his courage, he told her so.
“Me too," Irene Wyler said. "I always am.”
“You don't strike me as always being sad.”
“That's not what I mean.”
Randall felt confused.
Dry-eyed, Irene Wyler kissed him on the nose.
"Did you have a good time last night, meaning all night?" She grinned impishly.
"You know the answer to that."
"Good. Now I have to go."
"Where?”
"Back."
Randall sighed in exasperation. "Back where?"
“You know." She got up and started to dress.
"No, I don't know."
"You'll figure it out."
Irene Wyler finished dressing and Randall started to get out of bed.
"Stay here, my love," Irene Wyler said. "I'll catch a cab.”
She leaned over and kissed him on the forehead.
Then disappeared.
#
Irene Wyler looked out at the audience sitting in the cloistered darkness of the movie theater. She could tell this new one, like all those before him, was fantasizing what it would be like with her.
She popped out of the screen, descended the stage, strolled down the center aisle and took the seat next to him.
"Don't worry," she whispered. "You're not hallucinating—I'm real."
She offered him her hand.
"Feel."
Fools (?) for Love
By Angela Camack
It was a blinding-hot day in Ellinia Kingdom, the Eastern and Western suns blazing. Harvest was in progress despite the heat. The threshers, large wheels with blades between them pulled by huge tusked oxen, gathered graingrass to be sent to be milled for bread. Workers pulled fruit and vegetables from trees. People on tiny steeds buzzed swiftly around the fields, bringing water to the workers.
The hardest work was reserved for prisoners and those out of favor with the kingdom, removing the rock trees from the perimeter of the fields. The rock trees were almost impossible to cut, and the wood was useless, but the hard roots of the trees grew into the fields, choking new growth and sapping the ground of water. Around the fields, overseers watched the workers’ progress. A percentage of all crops and goods were sent to the palace and council “for the good of the kingdom.” Should anyone spend too long mopping a brow, or enjoying a fine spring day, they would be noticed, and their productivity watched.
The kingdom had always been there, watching. All that ever changed was the balance between benevolence and harshness shown by the king. The family in power now, the Hevers, tended toward harshness and capriciousness. What was accepted and who was favored could change without notice or reasons given.
Attempts to rebel were small and easily extinguished. Ellinia was large and sparsely populated; groups eager for change could not easily communicate. Working the land and trying to establish trade left people too tired to plan rebellion.
Lenae and Madolyn met at the large tree at the forest’s entrance, as they had done since childhood. They had been committed to each other since then.
They both had the pristine beauty of the Ellinians; slender, small-boned, with large, almond shaped eyes tilted at the corners, mirrored by tilted ears. Both were dark-haired and dark-eyed. Lenae straightened the collar of his tunic and leaned against a tree, his lap harp slung along his shoulder. His left leg, injured in a childhood game (but in Ellinia no games were games), was troublesome today.
Madolyn knew without asking. “It’s bad now.”
“No, I’m just lazy,’
“Still want to get away for a while?”
“More than ever.” Madolyn was looking particularly lovely. She was simply dressed for a royal, in a white dress, a blue band holding back her hair. Her only jewels were blue earrings and the birth-sign necklace that Lenae gave her, and that she always wore. Only the sadness in her eyes seemed out of place.
“Glide?” she asked.
“Glide.” In Ellinia, on hot, windy days, the air was so thick that the light-boned Ellinians could be airborne. It was common to see men gliding home from the fields, or women sailing from the market, parcels in hand. Poles with metal handles were scattered
around the kingdom, to allow gliders to settle back on earth. Madolyn and Lenae ran a few steps and let the wind take them further into the woods. grabbing branches to let themselves down as they came to a bench in a small clearing.
Madolyn was a princess; Lenae the son of the ambassador to Felaria. They had always been together, but everything was upended now. Ellinia and its neighbor, Franks, had been at war over boarders for over 100 years. Fifty of those years ago, to stop the fighting, the kingdoms’ lands had been divided in equal proportions. However, different resources were in different areas, and the countries now fought over sharing them.
Now much of each country lay in ruins. Countless young men had died, or came home missing parts, or too quiet, with shattered pieces loose inside them. It was said that some of the land was so blood-soaked that nothing would grow anymore. Women took over some of the farms and trades, but who would be there to father sons to come after the missing men? The King of Franks came to Madolyn’s father with a proposal. One of his sons had died in the last siege. His wife had died two years ago, leaving him with only one son. If King Lesto would give him Madolyn, they would be families, Madolyn was young, heathy and certainly fertile. She would produce more sons, insuring his lineage. Once the rulers had grandchildren in common, surely, they could work toward peace.
This would solve many of King Lesto’s problems. Madolyn was a princess of the blood, but as bright as the Western sun and as stubborn and unyielding as the wood of the rock tree. She might not be as strong as a man, but she could argue you to death. He bitterly regretted allowing her an education. The gods had blessed him with one son, now visiting Ellinia’s allies. Why could he not have another with Madolyn’s intelligence and passion, all wasted on a woman?
Lesto could make several excellent matches for her, but he knew who she wanted; the ambassador’s son. Lenae was a teacher, a poet and troubadour, skills of lesser value in Ellinia. Madolyn should have known better. Fools, both, wasting time instead of negotiating the best matches possible.
But she had talked herself into the marriage with King Hugo. She had begun to argue with her father about the war between the two countries, and against jousts, mock battles and demonstrations of strength, which she saw as symbols of war. She even dared to suggest diplomatic proposals to him.
Having argued for peace at such length, she could hardly refuse to be part of a plan to bring it about. She agreed to marry King Hugo. He was a hard man who treated the people who tended his lands and castle miserably. He was given to drunkenness and adultery, but Madolyn would marry him. As luck would have it, Lenae had been offered a post at a university in Felaria. By the end of harvest, it would be over. Madolyn would be married and Lenae in Felaria. They were taking every moment possible in the time they had left.
Once they reached the clearing, they clung together, but could go no further. Madolyn’s purity and fertility were currency; her virginity was proof that any sons would be of her husband’s lineage. Even a princess of the blood would be severely punished otherwise.
“How many days now?” she asked.
“Don’t think about it. Let’s just use the time we have.”
“I have to do this. It’s a chance to stop the fighting. If it can save lives, save land – “
“I know, Madolyn.” Lenae paused. “Look, I don’t need to leave. I can stay if you need me. I’ll be closer to you here than in Felaria. I can go on teaching here.”
“It’s such a chance for you. You know that poets are loved in Felaria. And it could be dangerous for if you were suspected of interfering in my marriage.
“I don’t care.”
“It hurts enough to let you go. I’d rather see you safe in Felaria, teaching and writing.” She smiled. “I’ve heard about those Felarian women. They’re a charming lot. You’ll have plenty of reasons to write poems ….”
“Oh, Madolyn.” He took her in his arms again. She pressed her face into his tunic. She made no sound, but he could feel her shoulders trembling and his tunic was soon soaked. In Ellinia, even royals learned in childhood that you did not sob. You did not display tears. You let nothing show.
Madolyn calmed and they talked. Lenae played his lap harp. Madolyn made up poems, terrible poems, but sharply descriptive of the people they knew. She could always make him laugh.
Finally, it was time to leave. They walked, feeling too heavy to glide.
Madolyn’s parents watched her plod back to the castle. “Out with the little lame genius again,” grumbled her father.
“Should we do something?’, asked her mother, Queen Jinna.
“No, the time to act was years ago. Let her see him. We need to keep her steady until the wedding.”
“She’d better go through with this.”
“She will. She sees herself as the peacemaker. That’s too much for her to resist.” He paused, looking out over his land. “Peace will be a relief.”
“We need the bride price Hugo will pay even more.”
Madolyn entered the castle. Her mother met her as she headed for her room. “Go and change, Madolyn. We’re having guests.”
“What’s wrong with what I have on?”
“Why you persist in dressing like a schoolgirl confounds me. You forget who you are.”
“How can I forget? I’m the prize cow at the marriage fair.”
Her mother sighed. She was counting the days until the marriage too. “Just, for once, do as I say! It can’t be too much of an ordeal to put on a silk gown and some jewels. And take off that stupid birth-sign, it’s juvenile.”
“Not likely,” muttered Madolyn.
“What did you say?”
“I said, I’ll tread lightly.”
Things were miserable between Madolyn and her mother and had been so even before the wedding was arranged. People whispered that her mother’s hostility arose from jealousy. She was a famous beauty, but Madolyn was young, and showed every sign of becoming more beautiful than her mother.
Lenae met with his Master of Swords after seeing Madolyn. All men in Ellinia who had any funds at all trained in the fighting arts. Lenae’s Master was one of the oldest and most respected. He was named judge, to oversee disputes and crimes dealing with battle. But he no longer took new pupils. He was tired to death of fighting with no cause, of soldiers who hurt those who were not soldiers, of those who took resources and women after battle.
Lenae worked with another former student, using swords, maces and lances. Master taught them how to compensate for shortcomings, to watch their opponents for clues and missteps and to work against their opponent’s strengths. “Sometimes it’s the muscle between the ears that helps you win,” he often said. He asked Lenae to stay after the session.
Lenae slowed his breathing and drank water, as Master’s assistant put away equipment. “You’re coming to me more often, son,” said Master.
“I feel I’m going to need it. I don’t know why.”
“And these are hard times for you. Lady Madolyn is very brave.” He laughed. “Do you remember when she kept asking why girls couldn’t go to fighting class?”
“Oh, I remember. She’s not so keen on fighting now. I just hope something comes from this marriage.”
“So do we all.”
There was feasting the next night, the first celebration of the match between Madolyn and Hugo. Madolyn was pale but composed, deftly dodging the paws of her betrothed and his proprietary embraces. Lenae was there, of course, representing his parents, who were in Felaria. His absence would have been noticed. But he could no longer watch the charade. Having made his
appearance, he left the hall and stepped into an alcove, almost stepping on a small, bedraggled bundle.
“Tippa?” A girl with tangled bronze hair, swollen eyes and a tears-and-paint smeared face pulled out a knife so swiftly it seemed to come from the folds of her dress. Tippa was a childhood friend who had family in Franks. They worked in Hugo’s castle; while staying with them she had become his mistress. She was mistress still even though his wife was dead.
“You.” She put away her knife. “What are you doing here?” Her words were slurred, and an empty wine bottle was beside her.
“I’m sorry, Tippa,” Moon above, she loves the brute, he thought.
“Save it. He’ll be atop your honey before you know it.” She paused. “I’m sorry, Lenae.”
“You can ….” He almost said that she could go on with Hugo but knew that would not console her.
“Yes, I know. He can still bed me, but not marry me. Still the whore. What do I have to give him?”
“Yourself, Tippa. In a fair world, that would be enough.”
Tippa howled, then crammed her fists to her mouth, stopping her sobs. Lenae took her in his arms. For the second time in as many days, a woman silently soaked him with tears.
“I’m going home now.” Tippa stood up unsteadily.
“I’m taking you.”
“Don’t want anybody to take me home!”
“Plenty of rudies leaving the party drunk. You don’t need them bothering you.” He wrapped her cape around her. His arm firmly around her waist, they plodded out, two people in love left behind by scheming and carelessness.
A Games was held the next day to honor the couple. Madolyn and her parents sat in their box with King Hugo and reviewed the parade of steeds and contenders. The sun caught the banners and the steeds’ reins and burnished the sand in the arena. The crowd roared, and ladies gave tokens to the contenders. Lenae was there, part of the ceremony, wearing his sword as required for the show.
The fights began. Some contenders played by the rules of such combat, meant to demonstrate skill and power but not to intentionally inflict damage. This being Ellinia, some did not heed the rules. As the games wore on, the sand turned red as some contenders hacked at opponents, thrust swords at men already down and aimed at hearts or livers. The game could be beautiful if played as a game; it could be a graceful dance that showed the power and intelligence of the fighters. Played for brute force, it was simply carnage. Some of the crowd roared anyway.
The games that were not games wore on. The air grew hotter and dustier, the crowd noisier and discontented as the wait for the last battle grew unusually long. Finally trumpets sounded and the Games Master came to the parapet. One of the final contenders had fallen in the preparation area and broken an arm.
The news spread through the crowd as the Games Master conferred with the King and Queen. They agreed to allow the Queen to choose a replacement. She stepped to the parapet.
“Let’s have a new champion,” her voice rang out. “Let’s see how far poems and songs can take us in battle today. I call on Lenae Bouldon to fight the final battle.”
The crowd buzzed. Lenae’s Master questioned a point of rule. The Queen overrode him. Madolyn’s face and lips went white. She started to rise from her chair, but Lenae caught her eye and shook his head. He could be punished for refusing to fight. He picked up his sword and walked to the royal box.
“Will you give me a token, my lady?’
Madolyn’s face was taut with the effort to keep control. She handed Lenae a gold ribbon. He put it though a buttonhole of his tunic and walked to the center of the arena.
His opponent was Earle Vestrin, a fighter for a long time. He was known to be brutal and his tactics even in the arena skirted the rules of battle. Some of the contenders, those who still looked for honor and fairness in the games, left in protest of the match; for Vestrin to face an unseasoned, lamed young man carried no honor.
The contestants bowed to the royal box and to each other. Almost as soon as they arose, Vestrin struck a blow that swiped the side of Lenae’s arm, tearing a fold of skin and leaving a patch of blood. Lenae wavered but recovered in time to block Vestrin’s next blow. And the next. And the next.
Lenae remembered Master’s teaching. His chance to come out of this alive was to avoid a mortal blow and tire his opponent. He saw that Vestrin turned his face slightly in the direction his next blow would go. Lenae parried each thrust. He then sidestepped the sword and thrust his own. Vestrin sidestepped it but almost slipped. Lenae thrust again and Vestrin parried. And again. Again.
Vestrin was getting angry. He didn’t expect any fight at all. He stopped thrusting and swung his sword in a circle. Lenae guessed that when Vestrin looked straight ahead he was changing tactics. He dropped to the ground and eluded the sword. The crowd roared its approval.
Lenae thrust his sword but Vestrin blocked it, pushing with his greater strength against Lenae. He pushed back as hard as he could but began to falter. “Impossible,” he thought. He dropped to the ground, rolled away and bobbed up again, thrusting his sword. The move so surprised Vestrin that he could barely parry Lenae’s sword. They continued. Lenae’s lame leg cramped and his muscles stung. Blood was seeping down his arm, but he kept on. The crowd was with him now.
They continued alternating thrusts. Vestrin’s sword nicked Lenae’s arms and hands but did no major damage. Vestrin’s frustration caused mistakes. His thrusts fell wide of his target and his footing slipped. Lenae parried another thrust and moved suddenly to his right and backwards. Vestrin lunged but overbalanced. Lenae thrust again and Vestrin fell trying to parry.
It was the luckiest of strokes. Lenae stood astride Vestrin’s body and held his sword to his throat. It was a signal of strength and a call for a decision of victory. Queen Jinna had the right to decide, as she had named the contender. She looked as if she could plunge the sword into Vestrin’s throat herself but named Lenae as victor.
The crowd roared again. The contenders bowed. Lenae almost felt sorry at seeing the shame in Vestrin’s face, but any pity was swept away by the power he felt. The Games Master gave Lenae his prize purse. “I’m alive,” he thought. “I’m going on from here.” Exhausted and bleeding, Lenae limped to the resting room on the side of the arena so that he could be bathed and treated. An attendant gave him a glass of brandy, red and warm, which he
drank gratefully as his wounds were cleaned and dressed. Soon he heard noise at the door; Madolyn’s voice and the voices of attendants.
“Please my lady, the men are not dressed, my lady. Your friend is fine, he will be out soon.”
Lenae smiled and sipped brandy. His brave Madolyn. Then he suddenly felt cold.
What was Madolyn’s bravery going to do? Would it change anything? He thought of the bloodlust of the crowd. He remembered the Queen’s look of triumph as she sent him into the ring to possible death and smiled as she witnessed her daughter’s agony. He thought of the game that was not a game in the arena today, where his opponent would have gladly killed him just because he could. Time after time, the violence won out. Madolyn would sacrifice herself for nothing. The violence was etched deep in the bones here. Would it surface in him? He remembered the exhilaration he felt after the battle with Vestrin. Would he ever want to fight simply for the power of fighting? They had to get out and go to Felaria.
He met Madolyn in the forest clearing the next day and told her of his plan. She paced in a circle as she considered her responsibilities, to the kingdom, to herself, to Lenae. Finally, she stopped pacing.
“You’re right. Change will need more than one marriage to come.”
“So, you’ll come to Felaria with me.”
“Yes. Of course, yes.”
Once decided, they moved quickly. They packed as lightly as possible. Lenae gathered his winnings from the arena, his travel fund and savings. Madolyn took jewels that were not part of the royal treasure, good ones that would not be traced to the kingdom that they could sell if needed.
That night, they went to the Master’s home. As judge, he could marry them. He did so, not without reservations; he was thinking of the plan for Madolyn to marry Hugo.
“I know it will take much strength to marry King Hugo, and to leave Lenae, but have you thought what your leaving will mean?”
“If I thought my marriage would change anything I would do it, no matter what I had to give up. But it won’t.”
“Point well taken, my lady.”
“Master, why should peace depend on one marriage between two people? Aren’t the kingdoms tired of the fighting?”
“Many are. There have been rebellions, after all, always small, always quickly put down. Perhaps the drive for change will get stronger.”
His assistant took them, not to the nearest port but one farther from the city, where it would be less likely that Madolyn would be recognized. Without jewels, simply dressed and keeping quietly to herself, she was seen only as the poet’s lovely bride. They bought passage on the next ship to Felaria.
The early morning ship took them on their way, the poet and his new wife. They spent much of the voyage keeping quietly in their cabin, which caused only amusement among the other passengers (and where they spent most of the time doing what the passengers thought they were up to). Lenae and Madolyn sat on the deck each evening if they could, watching the sea and sky turn dark and stars move across the sky, counting the days as the ship moved from Ellinian waters
though open waters and to Felarian waters. Best of all was the night they moved into Felarian space. They talked quietly, glasses of brandy shining redly by their chairs.
Madolyn pulled the collar of Lenae’s cape more closely around his throat. “Don’t get chilled. And I worry about those wounds. Please have the ship’s doctor have a look.”
“You know they’re healing, you dress them so capably every day.” Madolyn looked at him sternly. “All right, all right, tomorrow.”
Madolyn sat back in her chair. “We are safe, aren’t we?”
“Yes, we are. We made it to Felarian waters, didn’t we?”
“Would they send me back?”
“No. Felaria wouldn’t return anyone who was facing an unjust treatment.” Madolyn was not the first refugee from Ellinian harshness. And knowing the Felarians, they would probably be charmed by the idea of escaping for love.
“The Master and his helper? And your parents?”
“I watched. We weren’t followed. Master is too old and renowned to be punished. And my parents are safe in Felaria”
“I think my brother will come to see us.” Madolyn sighed with relief. “Then we’re fine.”
“Princess no more,” he said. “Is this too much to ask?
Madolyn shook her head. “No. Ellinia is not the kingdom for us, or for our children. No, I want a real home and to make a garden, and weave tapestries and read. I want to talk with your students and the teachers at the University.”
Lenae smiled. “That’s our kingdom.” He pulled her into an embrace. The sailors on watch noticed and burst into rowdy applause. Madolyn laughed. “Let’s go below, we are not here to entertain.” They went below to their cabin.
By Angela Camack
It was a blinding-hot day in Ellinia Kingdom, the Eastern and Western suns blazing. Harvest was in progress despite the heat. The threshers, large wheels with blades between them pulled by huge tusked oxen, gathered graingrass to be sent to be milled for bread. Workers pulled fruit and vegetables from trees. People on tiny steeds buzzed swiftly around the fields, bringing water to the workers.
The hardest work was reserved for prisoners and those out of favor with the kingdom, removing the rock trees from the perimeter of the fields. The rock trees were almost impossible to cut, and the wood was useless, but the hard roots of the trees grew into the fields, choking new growth and sapping the ground of water. Around the fields, overseers watched the workers’ progress. A percentage of all crops and goods were sent to the palace and council “for the good of the kingdom.” Should anyone spend too long mopping a brow, or enjoying a fine spring day, they would be noticed, and their productivity watched.
The kingdom had always been there, watching. All that ever changed was the balance between benevolence and harshness shown by the king. The family in power now, the Hevers, tended toward harshness and capriciousness. What was accepted and who was favored could change without notice or reasons given.
Attempts to rebel were small and easily extinguished. Ellinia was large and sparsely populated; groups eager for change could not easily communicate. Working the land and trying to establish trade left people too tired to plan rebellion.
Lenae and Madolyn met at the large tree at the forest’s entrance, as they had done since childhood. They had been committed to each other since then.
They both had the pristine beauty of the Ellinians; slender, small-boned, with large, almond shaped eyes tilted at the corners, mirrored by tilted ears. Both were dark-haired and dark-eyed. Lenae straightened the collar of his tunic and leaned against a tree, his lap harp slung along his shoulder. His left leg, injured in a childhood game (but in Ellinia no games were games), was troublesome today.
Madolyn knew without asking. “It’s bad now.”
“No, I’m just lazy,’
“Still want to get away for a while?”
“More than ever.” Madolyn was looking particularly lovely. She was simply dressed for a royal, in a white dress, a blue band holding back her hair. Her only jewels were blue earrings and the birth-sign necklace that Lenae gave her, and that she always wore. Only the sadness in her eyes seemed out of place.
“Glide?” she asked.
“Glide.” In Ellinia, on hot, windy days, the air was so thick that the light-boned Ellinians could be airborne. It was common to see men gliding home from the fields, or women sailing from the market, parcels in hand. Poles with metal handles were scattered
around the kingdom, to allow gliders to settle back on earth. Madolyn and Lenae ran a few steps and let the wind take them further into the woods. grabbing branches to let themselves down as they came to a bench in a small clearing.
Madolyn was a princess; Lenae the son of the ambassador to Felaria. They had always been together, but everything was upended now. Ellinia and its neighbor, Franks, had been at war over boarders for over 100 years. Fifty of those years ago, to stop the fighting, the kingdoms’ lands had been divided in equal proportions. However, different resources were in different areas, and the countries now fought over sharing them.
Now much of each country lay in ruins. Countless young men had died, or came home missing parts, or too quiet, with shattered pieces loose inside them. It was said that some of the land was so blood-soaked that nothing would grow anymore. Women took over some of the farms and trades, but who would be there to father sons to come after the missing men? The King of Franks came to Madolyn’s father with a proposal. One of his sons had died in the last siege. His wife had died two years ago, leaving him with only one son. If King Lesto would give him Madolyn, they would be families, Madolyn was young, heathy and certainly fertile. She would produce more sons, insuring his lineage. Once the rulers had grandchildren in common, surely, they could work toward peace.
This would solve many of King Lesto’s problems. Madolyn was a princess of the blood, but as bright as the Western sun and as stubborn and unyielding as the wood of the rock tree. She might not be as strong as a man, but she could argue you to death. He bitterly regretted allowing her an education. The gods had blessed him with one son, now visiting Ellinia’s allies. Why could he not have another with Madolyn’s intelligence and passion, all wasted on a woman?
Lesto could make several excellent matches for her, but he knew who she wanted; the ambassador’s son. Lenae was a teacher, a poet and troubadour, skills of lesser value in Ellinia. Madolyn should have known better. Fools, both, wasting time instead of negotiating the best matches possible.
But she had talked herself into the marriage with King Hugo. She had begun to argue with her father about the war between the two countries, and against jousts, mock battles and demonstrations of strength, which she saw as symbols of war. She even dared to suggest diplomatic proposals to him.
Having argued for peace at such length, she could hardly refuse to be part of a plan to bring it about. She agreed to marry King Hugo. He was a hard man who treated the people who tended his lands and castle miserably. He was given to drunkenness and adultery, but Madolyn would marry him. As luck would have it, Lenae had been offered a post at a university in Felaria. By the end of harvest, it would be over. Madolyn would be married and Lenae in Felaria. They were taking every moment possible in the time they had left.
Once they reached the clearing, they clung together, but could go no further. Madolyn’s purity and fertility were currency; her virginity was proof that any sons would be of her husband’s lineage. Even a princess of the blood would be severely punished otherwise.
“How many days now?” she asked.
“Don’t think about it. Let’s just use the time we have.”
“I have to do this. It’s a chance to stop the fighting. If it can save lives, save land – “
“I know, Madolyn.” Lenae paused. “Look, I don’t need to leave. I can stay if you need me. I’ll be closer to you here than in Felaria. I can go on teaching here.”
“It’s such a chance for you. You know that poets are loved in Felaria. And it could be dangerous for if you were suspected of interfering in my marriage.
“I don’t care.”
“It hurts enough to let you go. I’d rather see you safe in Felaria, teaching and writing.” She smiled. “I’ve heard about those Felarian women. They’re a charming lot. You’ll have plenty of reasons to write poems ….”
“Oh, Madolyn.” He took her in his arms again. She pressed her face into his tunic. She made no sound, but he could feel her shoulders trembling and his tunic was soon soaked. In Ellinia, even royals learned in childhood that you did not sob. You did not display tears. You let nothing show.
Madolyn calmed and they talked. Lenae played his lap harp. Madolyn made up poems, terrible poems, but sharply descriptive of the people they knew. She could always make him laugh.
Finally, it was time to leave. They walked, feeling too heavy to glide.
Madolyn’s parents watched her plod back to the castle. “Out with the little lame genius again,” grumbled her father.
“Should we do something?’, asked her mother, Queen Jinna.
“No, the time to act was years ago. Let her see him. We need to keep her steady until the wedding.”
“She’d better go through with this.”
“She will. She sees herself as the peacemaker. That’s too much for her to resist.” He paused, looking out over his land. “Peace will be a relief.”
“We need the bride price Hugo will pay even more.”
Madolyn entered the castle. Her mother met her as she headed for her room. “Go and change, Madolyn. We’re having guests.”
“What’s wrong with what I have on?”
“Why you persist in dressing like a schoolgirl confounds me. You forget who you are.”
“How can I forget? I’m the prize cow at the marriage fair.”
Her mother sighed. She was counting the days until the marriage too. “Just, for once, do as I say! It can’t be too much of an ordeal to put on a silk gown and some jewels. And take off that stupid birth-sign, it’s juvenile.”
“Not likely,” muttered Madolyn.
“What did you say?”
“I said, I’ll tread lightly.”
Things were miserable between Madolyn and her mother and had been so even before the wedding was arranged. People whispered that her mother’s hostility arose from jealousy. She was a famous beauty, but Madolyn was young, and showed every sign of becoming more beautiful than her mother.
Lenae met with his Master of Swords after seeing Madolyn. All men in Ellinia who had any funds at all trained in the fighting arts. Lenae’s Master was one of the oldest and most respected. He was named judge, to oversee disputes and crimes dealing with battle. But he no longer took new pupils. He was tired to death of fighting with no cause, of soldiers who hurt those who were not soldiers, of those who took resources and women after battle.
Lenae worked with another former student, using swords, maces and lances. Master taught them how to compensate for shortcomings, to watch their opponents for clues and missteps and to work against their opponent’s strengths. “Sometimes it’s the muscle between the ears that helps you win,” he often said. He asked Lenae to stay after the session.
Lenae slowed his breathing and drank water, as Master’s assistant put away equipment. “You’re coming to me more often, son,” said Master.
“I feel I’m going to need it. I don’t know why.”
“And these are hard times for you. Lady Madolyn is very brave.” He laughed. “Do you remember when she kept asking why girls couldn’t go to fighting class?”
“Oh, I remember. She’s not so keen on fighting now. I just hope something comes from this marriage.”
“So do we all.”
There was feasting the next night, the first celebration of the match between Madolyn and Hugo. Madolyn was pale but composed, deftly dodging the paws of her betrothed and his proprietary embraces. Lenae was there, of course, representing his parents, who were in Felaria. His absence would have been noticed. But he could no longer watch the charade. Having made his
appearance, he left the hall and stepped into an alcove, almost stepping on a small, bedraggled bundle.
“Tippa?” A girl with tangled bronze hair, swollen eyes and a tears-and-paint smeared face pulled out a knife so swiftly it seemed to come from the folds of her dress. Tippa was a childhood friend who had family in Franks. They worked in Hugo’s castle; while staying with them she had become his mistress. She was mistress still even though his wife was dead.
“You.” She put away her knife. “What are you doing here?” Her words were slurred, and an empty wine bottle was beside her.
“I’m sorry, Tippa,” Moon above, she loves the brute, he thought.
“Save it. He’ll be atop your honey before you know it.” She paused. “I’m sorry, Lenae.”
“You can ….” He almost said that she could go on with Hugo but knew that would not console her.
“Yes, I know. He can still bed me, but not marry me. Still the whore. What do I have to give him?”
“Yourself, Tippa. In a fair world, that would be enough.”
Tippa howled, then crammed her fists to her mouth, stopping her sobs. Lenae took her in his arms. For the second time in as many days, a woman silently soaked him with tears.
“I’m going home now.” Tippa stood up unsteadily.
“I’m taking you.”
“Don’t want anybody to take me home!”
“Plenty of rudies leaving the party drunk. You don’t need them bothering you.” He wrapped her cape around her. His arm firmly around her waist, they plodded out, two people in love left behind by scheming and carelessness.
A Games was held the next day to honor the couple. Madolyn and her parents sat in their box with King Hugo and reviewed the parade of steeds and contenders. The sun caught the banners and the steeds’ reins and burnished the sand in the arena. The crowd roared, and ladies gave tokens to the contenders. Lenae was there, part of the ceremony, wearing his sword as required for the show.
The fights began. Some contenders played by the rules of such combat, meant to demonstrate skill and power but not to intentionally inflict damage. This being Ellinia, some did not heed the rules. As the games wore on, the sand turned red as some contenders hacked at opponents, thrust swords at men already down and aimed at hearts or livers. The game could be beautiful if played as a game; it could be a graceful dance that showed the power and intelligence of the fighters. Played for brute force, it was simply carnage. Some of the crowd roared anyway.
The games that were not games wore on. The air grew hotter and dustier, the crowd noisier and discontented as the wait for the last battle grew unusually long. Finally trumpets sounded and the Games Master came to the parapet. One of the final contenders had fallen in the preparation area and broken an arm.
The news spread through the crowd as the Games Master conferred with the King and Queen. They agreed to allow the Queen to choose a replacement. She stepped to the parapet.
“Let’s have a new champion,” her voice rang out. “Let’s see how far poems and songs can take us in battle today. I call on Lenae Bouldon to fight the final battle.”
The crowd buzzed. Lenae’s Master questioned a point of rule. The Queen overrode him. Madolyn’s face and lips went white. She started to rise from her chair, but Lenae caught her eye and shook his head. He could be punished for refusing to fight. He picked up his sword and walked to the royal box.
“Will you give me a token, my lady?’
Madolyn’s face was taut with the effort to keep control. She handed Lenae a gold ribbon. He put it though a buttonhole of his tunic and walked to the center of the arena.
His opponent was Earle Vestrin, a fighter for a long time. He was known to be brutal and his tactics even in the arena skirted the rules of battle. Some of the contenders, those who still looked for honor and fairness in the games, left in protest of the match; for Vestrin to face an unseasoned, lamed young man carried no honor.
The contestants bowed to the royal box and to each other. Almost as soon as they arose, Vestrin struck a blow that swiped the side of Lenae’s arm, tearing a fold of skin and leaving a patch of blood. Lenae wavered but recovered in time to block Vestrin’s next blow. And the next. And the next.
Lenae remembered Master’s teaching. His chance to come out of this alive was to avoid a mortal blow and tire his opponent. He saw that Vestrin turned his face slightly in the direction his next blow would go. Lenae parried each thrust. He then sidestepped the sword and thrust his own. Vestrin sidestepped it but almost slipped. Lenae thrust again and Vestrin parried. And again. Again.
Vestrin was getting angry. He didn’t expect any fight at all. He stopped thrusting and swung his sword in a circle. Lenae guessed that when Vestrin looked straight ahead he was changing tactics. He dropped to the ground and eluded the sword. The crowd roared its approval.
Lenae thrust his sword but Vestrin blocked it, pushing with his greater strength against Lenae. He pushed back as hard as he could but began to falter. “Impossible,” he thought. He dropped to the ground, rolled away and bobbed up again, thrusting his sword. The move so surprised Vestrin that he could barely parry Lenae’s sword. They continued. Lenae’s lame leg cramped and his muscles stung. Blood was seeping down his arm, but he kept on. The crowd was with him now.
They continued alternating thrusts. Vestrin’s sword nicked Lenae’s arms and hands but did no major damage. Vestrin’s frustration caused mistakes. His thrusts fell wide of his target and his footing slipped. Lenae parried another thrust and moved suddenly to his right and backwards. Vestrin lunged but overbalanced. Lenae thrust again and Vestrin fell trying to parry.
It was the luckiest of strokes. Lenae stood astride Vestrin’s body and held his sword to his throat. It was a signal of strength and a call for a decision of victory. Queen Jinna had the right to decide, as she had named the contender. She looked as if she could plunge the sword into Vestrin’s throat herself but named Lenae as victor.
The crowd roared again. The contenders bowed. Lenae almost felt sorry at seeing the shame in Vestrin’s face, but any pity was swept away by the power he felt. The Games Master gave Lenae his prize purse. “I’m alive,” he thought. “I’m going on from here.” Exhausted and bleeding, Lenae limped to the resting room on the side of the arena so that he could be bathed and treated. An attendant gave him a glass of brandy, red and warm, which he
drank gratefully as his wounds were cleaned and dressed. Soon he heard noise at the door; Madolyn’s voice and the voices of attendants.
“Please my lady, the men are not dressed, my lady. Your friend is fine, he will be out soon.”
Lenae smiled and sipped brandy. His brave Madolyn. Then he suddenly felt cold.
What was Madolyn’s bravery going to do? Would it change anything? He thought of the bloodlust of the crowd. He remembered the Queen’s look of triumph as she sent him into the ring to possible death and smiled as she witnessed her daughter’s agony. He thought of the game that was not a game in the arena today, where his opponent would have gladly killed him just because he could. Time after time, the violence won out. Madolyn would sacrifice herself for nothing. The violence was etched deep in the bones here. Would it surface in him? He remembered the exhilaration he felt after the battle with Vestrin. Would he ever want to fight simply for the power of fighting? They had to get out and go to Felaria.
He met Madolyn in the forest clearing the next day and told her of his plan. She paced in a circle as she considered her responsibilities, to the kingdom, to herself, to Lenae. Finally, she stopped pacing.
“You’re right. Change will need more than one marriage to come.”
“So, you’ll come to Felaria with me.”
“Yes. Of course, yes.”
Once decided, they moved quickly. They packed as lightly as possible. Lenae gathered his winnings from the arena, his travel fund and savings. Madolyn took jewels that were not part of the royal treasure, good ones that would not be traced to the kingdom that they could sell if needed.
That night, they went to the Master’s home. As judge, he could marry them. He did so, not without reservations; he was thinking of the plan for Madolyn to marry Hugo.
“I know it will take much strength to marry King Hugo, and to leave Lenae, but have you thought what your leaving will mean?”
“If I thought my marriage would change anything I would do it, no matter what I had to give up. But it won’t.”
“Point well taken, my lady.”
“Master, why should peace depend on one marriage between two people? Aren’t the kingdoms tired of the fighting?”
“Many are. There have been rebellions, after all, always small, always quickly put down. Perhaps the drive for change will get stronger.”
His assistant took them, not to the nearest port but one farther from the city, where it would be less likely that Madolyn would be recognized. Without jewels, simply dressed and keeping quietly to herself, she was seen only as the poet’s lovely bride. They bought passage on the next ship to Felaria.
The early morning ship took them on their way, the poet and his new wife. They spent much of the voyage keeping quietly in their cabin, which caused only amusement among the other passengers (and where they spent most of the time doing what the passengers thought they were up to). Lenae and Madolyn sat on the deck each evening if they could, watching the sea and sky turn dark and stars move across the sky, counting the days as the ship moved from Ellinian waters
though open waters and to Felarian waters. Best of all was the night they moved into Felarian space. They talked quietly, glasses of brandy shining redly by their chairs.
Madolyn pulled the collar of Lenae’s cape more closely around his throat. “Don’t get chilled. And I worry about those wounds. Please have the ship’s doctor have a look.”
“You know they’re healing, you dress them so capably every day.” Madolyn looked at him sternly. “All right, all right, tomorrow.”
Madolyn sat back in her chair. “We are safe, aren’t we?”
“Yes, we are. We made it to Felarian waters, didn’t we?”
“Would they send me back?”
“No. Felaria wouldn’t return anyone who was facing an unjust treatment.” Madolyn was not the first refugee from Ellinian harshness. And knowing the Felarians, they would probably be charmed by the idea of escaping for love.
“The Master and his helper? And your parents?”
“I watched. We weren’t followed. Master is too old and renowned to be punished. And my parents are safe in Felaria”
“I think my brother will come to see us.” Madolyn sighed with relief. “Then we’re fine.”
“Princess no more,” he said. “Is this too much to ask?
Madolyn shook her head. “No. Ellinia is not the kingdom for us, or for our children. No, I want a real home and to make a garden, and weave tapestries and read. I want to talk with your students and the teachers at the University.”
Lenae smiled. “That’s our kingdom.” He pulled her into an embrace. The sailors on watch noticed and burst into rowdy applause. Madolyn laughed. “Let’s go below, we are not here to entertain.” They went below to their cabin.
The Lost Journals of Edgar Parry
By Mason Yates
I do not expect these journals ever to be seen or read by the public eye- not only because the government would prevent citizens to acknowledge a failed manned mission to the planet Zorgen, but also because Edgar Parry’s discovered journals clearly depict many infractions against the rules of the United Territories of Earth. Free Speech is a conception of the past, and Captain Parry’s journals harshly criticize our so-called “democracy,” which even I admit is more of a totalitarian state. It is expected that Edgar Parry came to a state of contumacy after Eagle Bird IV- a spaceship designed for interstellar space travel- began to malfunction, creating the need for Captain Perry to disembark using an escape pod.
These written records were discovered on Zorgen fifty years after Edgar Parry landed. Although the public is unaware of the existence of these journals, I, James Conley, the head of the United Territories of Earth’s space program- and a secretive rebel myself, if I have the guts to admit- have the knowledge of Captain Parry’s journals. Perhaps in my old age when I have nothing left to lose, I will release these journals to the public, but as of right now, I must stay quiet and secretively abhor the rules and regulations set by the world government.
If these journals are ever released, I say to you, the reader, that these are completely real. When you gaze up at the empyreal night sky, please remember Captain Edgar Parry, and please, please refuse to be stifled by the system of government you have been born into. You, reader, are not a slave, but if you continue to be suppressed of knowledge, a slave is what you will become. If these journals ever come to the public eye, use them as an inspiration to break away the chains that the United Territories of Earth have wrapped around you.
***
Day 1.
There is no other way to describe the situation I have found myself in. There is nothing adventurous or audacious about what I am going to say. Instead, what I have done is necessary for survival. Eagle Bird IV began to experience malfunctions two days ago, and Eric Whim, our mechanic, tried to fix it, but he was unable to. At first, it was small malfunctions, but over the course of forty-eight hours, the malfunctions grew more and more worrisome. By the time Eagle Bird’s engines exploded, I had already prepared the escape pod. I am not a hero. In fact, I consider myself a coward for leaving Eric behind. As the pod shot away from the spacecraft, I stared out my window and watched as Eagle Bird blew to smithereens. I did not see Eric in the explosion, but I can imagine what happened to him. Jesus Christ, it was awful.
Hours later, after the wreckage of Eagle Bird became only a speck in the distance, I took care of acknowledging what I had to sustain myself until rescue. I found over four hundred nutrition pills, twenty gallons of water, and many toiletries. Thank God for the invention of nutrition pills; a pill the size of a dime is the same as eating a buffet, and best of all, it actually gives you the feeling of being full. I took one right then and there, following up with a sip of water. Then, I recapped the water and told myself it was time to conserve. I had no idea how long it would be until rescue.
The rest of the day was meaningless. I gazed out the window, daydreamed of getting back to Earth, and thought about Eric’s family. As I sit here now, I realize that someday I might grow insane by being in this tiny pod. Give it a few days or a few weeks, and I bet I’ll crack. I hope not.
For now, I need to sleep. The first day has come to an end, and I wonder how many more there is to go.
Day 2.
Nothing happened today that is very much different than yesterday. I took a pill in the morning and followed it with a gulp of water. Around lunch, I skipped a pill. However, I did take another gulp of water. I need to conserve, so I only take as much as a mouthful of water at a time. In the middle of the afternoon, I took another mouthful. By dinner, I took a pill and another gulp to swallow it.
Now, I sleep. Due to the lack of gravity, I find myself floating when I wake up. Sometimes it’s hard to sleep, but for the most part I grow used to it.
Day 4.
I had always hated arduous tasks, but now, as I sit in the pod and gaze out the window at the infinite darkness that is speckled with stars that reside trillions of miles away, I wish I could do some heavy lifting. I feel weak. All I do is sit around, and if you hadn’t noticed, I skipped day three. This is because there is nothing to do. I sit, I take a pill twice a day, and I drink three or four mouthfuls of water.
The only way I keep track of the day is by my watch. Luckily, it wasn’t damaged when I escaped Eagle Bird. With my luck, I thought I would have knocked it against a wall and broken it. However, I was proved wrong; it’s fully intact and working. As I write this passage, I stare at it, thinking of the day I received it. I vividly remember my wife- my beloved, beautiful wife- come home from work with a little blue box in her hand. I had been in the kitchen working tirelessly on a math problem for the very mission that I had been on just four days ago. As I sat focused on the half-finished equation, my wife placed the box in front of me and told me to open it. I secretly cursed the distraction, but I couldn’t upset her. I put my pen down and opened the box. Inside, the watch I have on my wrist.
Oh, how I desire to return to Aberdeen, my wife. I pause as I write and think about her. I see her long blond hair, her gentle lips, her skinny waist, and slender, perfect legs. She does have a few imperfections despite her glorious body, but every imperfection is just another reason for me to love her. As I write, I wonder what she is doing. Does she know about the Eagle Bird malfunction? I shake my head. Of course, she doesn’t know. The United Territories would never disclose such a failure. To speak of Eagle Bird’s destruction would be horrific. Eagle Bird IV was the epoch of history thus far. If it failed, the citizens would question its leaders, its government. Those bastards!
I need to put the pen down. I should rest.
Day 8.
I think the pod is starting to manipulate my mind. Sometimes, as I sit and stare into open space, I feel fine. Other times, I slip into a fugue that envelops around me. For a split second, I become unaware of where I am. My mind projects images that depict moments from the past. One moment I’m inside the pod, gazing out at the infinite black, then the next I find myself sitting in a garden beside my wife, staring at the red, white, blue, and yellow flowers. Another moment I find myself about to swallow water, then the next, I’m standing beside a lake with a fishing pole in my hand.
Although these moments are beautiful, they are also terrifying. Terrifying not only because I don’t know what’s happening, but terrifying because they bring a painful nostalgia along with it. I yearn to go home. I look around me and ponder why I’m even here. What led to this?
Isolation is starting to get to me. Imagine sitting inside a blank room with no one to talk to. Imagine doing that for a week. This is how I am. I’m alone. Nobody deserves this. Nobody. Not even prisoners who are held in solitary confinement. Not even them.
Day 14.
As I said before, there are days where I don’t write, because if I do, it would only be rambling on. There is nothing to do in the pod other than stare out the window, think, and cry. Yes, I’ve done a lot of crying the past couple of days. I started to cry when I first saw my wife in the pod with me. I know she’s only a phantasm, but she looks so real. She sits beside me
sometimes. She strokes my hair. She stares into my eyes. However, she never speaks. Maybe she does, though, for I never attempt to talk to her. I just sit in comfort whenever she comes. I love her so much, but I need to get away from her. She’s only making my heart break even more. I need to land somewhere. Eagle Bird IV had been on its way to Zorgen, but that is so far away.
Day 23.
In my last journal entry, I had spoken too soon. Travelling through an endless void of black, I had become unaware of my surroundings. Instead of knowing my course, I was a floating object with no destination. I had no idea where I was. Now, I do. Ahead, in the distance, I see Zorgen. I know it is the planet I am looking for; it looks the same as the photos I had seen.
Luckily, the pod has an engine capable of landing. As I write, I am guiding the pod to the planet. By tomorrow, I hope I shall land. Eventually, I suspect there should be another version of Eagle Bird- maybe Eagle Bird V or VI- that is going to land on Zorgen. Until then, I need to survive. Maybe in thirty or forty years I will be reunited with mankind. Just the thought excites me.
Day 24.
I have landed. I find myself in the middle of a grassy field, which looks very similar to Earth. Someday, I anticipate that mankind will find a home here. I imagine the same field that I currently reside filled with homes. I can already hear children’s laughter as they play outside. For now, though, it is only I. Alone, I look around me as I sit in the grass. In the distance, there
are large trees, similar to jungle trees, and in the opposite direction, there are many hills, which I can’t help but notice share a resemblance to the rolling hills of the Midwest United States, the place I once called home. Tomorrow, for I can already tell it is getting late, I will explore. As for now, I need to set my journal down and get some sleep; I have a big day ahead of me.
Day 25.
I have just returned to the pod from a day of exploring. I must admit that halfway through the day, I managed to get lost, and it is to a great relief that I am back to where my base is. Imagine being lost in a foreign place with no one to guide you. Seeing the pod after so many hours of stumbling around was amazing. It looked like a trophy in the distance. I ran to it and almost hugged the damn thing.
As for the day, it was filled with many sights. Early in the morning, I woke up and took a pill and followed it with seven or eight wonderful gulps of water. I allowed myself to drink more because I felt that I would need the hydration for the day to come. Also, I had no doubts that I would come across a lake or a stream in my travels, and indeed, I did. However, I am jumping too far ahead of myself. Let me start at the beginning.
I emerged from the pod to see that the sun was just over the horizon line. I wondered to myself if Zorgen was a twenty-four-hour day or not, but I had no way of knowing until nighttime. From sleeping, I came to the realization that night lasted about eight hours, which is similar to Earth’s night. As for the day, I assumed it was similar to Earth’s day as well, so I stepped out of the pod, thinking that I should be out for no longer than ten hours. With that in my mind, I walked towards the jungle. With me, I carried nothing more than the shirt on my back. I had no clue if that was a smart thing to do, but from my overnight visit, I came to the
conclusion that there probably wasn’t anything dangerous on Zorgen. If there was, I assumed it would have heard my pod land and would have come forth to see what it was. However, there was nothing outside last night except for the landscape, and for that, I was glad.
The outskirt of the jungle was a twenty-five-minute walk away, and when I reached it, I became aware of how vast the ecosystem was. I was hesitant if I should enter the new biome, but after a few minutes of gazing into the jungle and staring at the massive trees, I stepped in, immediately immersed into a new landscape. I walked on without looking back.
As I continued through the jungle, I noticed that there were ferns that had dew on their leaves. It turned out that I was correct about Zorgen harboring water. I brushed my hand over the ferns, feeling the wetness. I couldn’t help but smile despite my predicament of being so far from home. It was no doubt a great feeling being the first person to walk on a planet not already home to humans. And it was no doubt a great feeling discovering water on a planet that I knew that humans would eventually make a home. I was the first! My name would be sketched into history, but then again, maybe it wouldn’t. I thought about Earth’s corrupt government and fell into a state of sadness. No one would know my name, and my wife would forget who I was. Me? I was just an illusion. The United Territories of Earth would make sure to erase my name, for they could never allow to admit a failure on their part. To the people on Earth, they probably assumed Eagle Bird IV landed. Well, I guess it was partly true. One person- me- on Eagle Bird IV landed.
I thought about this for a second and was greatly appreciative when I suddenly heard the susurration of water. At first, something whispered my name, dragging me out of my depression. Then, I heard what it really was. I dropped my hand from the fern and bounded through the jungle. As I grew closer to the water, it sounded as if it was all around me, but I
knew it was only an illusion because of how loud the water was. I guessed it must have been a fast current, and I was correct. I bolted through the underbrush and came to a steady, fast river. The water was brown, and it was surging violently. I stayed back, thinking that if I stepped into it, I would be grasped and tossed like a ragdoll, probably pulled under the current to drown. Boy, that would not be a good way to die. That way, I was for sure going to be forgotten in history. The three trillion humans- occupying Earth, Earth’s Moon, and Mars- would never know my name. Then again, they weren’t going to know my name in the first place.
I watched the water for a time, hypnotized by it. It was the first river ever found by mankind on Zorgen. As I stood there, I thought about how nice it would be if it were named after me. Parry River. Then, I thought about how dumb I was thinking and walked off, staying close to the river so I wouldn’t lose it.
I walked on for an hour or two. I saw nothing more than the usual ferns, trees, and water. At first sight of these things, I marveled at them, but as I walked on, I grew bored of them. I decided it was best to break away from the water and travel through the jungle again. I could hear the water for a long while after leaving the river, but after a half an hour or so, the susurration dissolved into the distance. Again, I was thrown back into the quiet. I continued navigating my way through the jungle. Every once in a while, I had to pause and go around a patch of thick underbrush, but other than that, it was easy going.
I believe it is crucial to write about the weather as well. As I walked through the jungle, I began to sweat and notice that the weather was hot. By hot, I do not mean a ridiculous, extreme heat, but it was very warm, most likely in the low hundreds- Fahrenheit, of course. It was bearable but uncomfortable. It was a good thing that my adventurous mind was taking me away
from the heat; I could barely feel the weather. There were a few times I wished it would rain, but the day was all sun. I continued forward, pushing against the heat.
After an hour or two of walking aimlessly, I noticed a piquant smell. The more I walked, the more potent it became. It reminded me of my youth when my father would take me hunting. During a quick flashbulb memory of my younger self walking through a forest towards a dead deer, I understood why the smell was familiar. It was the smell of a dead body. Although it was ripe, I hurried my pace, hoping to see what kind of animal it was. Then, it struck me that it could be a human. However, I knew that was unlikely. If there were humans on Zorgen, they would have investigated the pod. But what if they couldn’t find where the pod landed?
I shoved the thoughts out of my mind and stumbled forward, knowing the smell was close. I waded through a dense of patch of underbrush, and when I came out of the patch, I saw what it was: a cluster of many dead, distorted animals. They were so mauled to death that I could not understand what species of animals they were, but due to the brown fur that I saw, I think they were squirrels of some sort. That is my best guess.
I took one last look at the destruction and walked off, hoping to find what sort of savage beast had mangled those animals. If someone is reading this, they may find that I was stupid to try to hunt the suspect of the murders, and I would have to agree with you. However, I was possessed with so much curiosity that I had to see what had done the damage.
Another hour or so later, I came across a clearing in the jungle. In this clearing, there were multiple unique things: a shimmering pond that beheld the freshest-looking water I had ever gazed at, numerous large boulders, and a plentiful amount of grass that stretched at least the size of a few football fields in length. That wasn’t what attracted my attention, though, for I was much more amazed by a strikingly familiar creature that was in the middle of the field: a horse-
or something that appeared very similar to a horse. It was brown, large, and had a mane that shined in the sun.
Is that what killed those animals? I asked myself that question as I stared at the creature. I thought I was going to step forward into the clearing and announce my presence, but instead, I stayed back and watched. The horse stayed still, not moving an inch. He was gazing upward and away from where I now crouched at the outskirt of the clearing. For some reason, I think the horse knew- or felt- that I was there. He knew someone was watching him, but I had no idea how, because I had not made a sound or an appearance. I was hidden behind a large fern, barely peeking my head out to see. How could the horse know I was there?
I sat there for over an hour watching the creature, then I moved off. It became evident that the horse was not going to move a muscle until it was certain that I had left. So, feeling defeated that I had not seen movement, I quietly crept back into the jungle, unsure if I would see the creature again.
It was after seeing the horse that I became lost. I wandered through the forest aimlessly. I came across nothing worth mentioning. Finally, after hours, I found the pod with a sigh of relief.
I should get some rest. Tomorrow, I plan to explore again. This time, I’m going towards the hills.
Day 26.
The hills were fascinating to say the least. The day started out with the usual pill and drink of water, but as the day went by, it grew more and more unusual. I started out by walking towards the hills, not really going in any direction, just meandering along, hoping to find
something of interest. The hills were grassy, but as the pod grew more distant, I noticed there were an abundance of flower patches. Red, blue, white, yellow, and orange flowers blossomed and caught my eye. A few times I went over to a patch and sniffed the wonderful objects. It reminded me of the garden that my wife and I had at home. After a few sniffs, I couldn’t bear to be dragged back to the past by the nostalgic smell, so I carried on with my journey.
I wonder what I would have looked like to native of Zorgen. What would I call them? Zorgians? I’m not sure. However, I wonder what they would have thought of me. Standing in the distance, watching me as I traversed the landscape, they probably would have thought I was on some pleasurable drug, for I was walking around with my eyes wide open, gazing at everything as if it was some extraordinary piece of art; while, in fact, the hills and the rest of the landscape around me was just one of the many features of Zorgen. Somewhere on the planet, I assume, there are many landscapes that would make me fall to my knees in tears. The beauty of Zorgen has yet to be discovered.
Now, mankind has created habitats on two other homes other than Earth- Mars and the Moon. I have seen the cities of Mars and the bases on the moon, but let me tell you, the reader- I assume that perhaps one day someone will read this- that Zorgen is beyond anything I have ever seen. Mars and the Moon have no comparison. Zorgen is like Earth 2.0, but I suspect Zorgen may be much more beautiful.
I kept traveling in my dream-like state, still gazing in wonder at the landscape. At the peak of a hill, I looked out and saw a sea of small rolling mountains. The hills were ample, never-ending. How far could they go? I don’t know, but I did travel a little further.
An hour later, I reached what I thought of as a valley, and in this valley, I was shocked to find the horse. I asked myself if it was the same horse that I had seen earlier, and I was almost
certain of it. I could not ascertain that it was, but I was close to positive that the animal was the same. Immediately, directly upon seeing it, I fell to the grass and tried to get to cover. When I felt hidden, I watched, but once again, the horse remained still. When I first crested the hill, I vividly remember the horse bowing his head to sniff or eat the grass below it, but now, it was a statue. I’m sure that it felt my presence again. He knew I was there. Nevertheless, I watched.
Minutes later, something happened. A phenomenon took place, something that I doubt anyone that reads this will ever believe. The horse started to shake as if an earthquake was rumbling it- back and forth, back and forth, then, up and down, up and down, something undulating it in a quick motion. I remained still and concluded that it was not an earthquake causing the motion. Something- I don’t know what- was forcing it to move furiously. Then, the horse began to morph. The creature was no longer a horse, but instead, it became a black shape floating a few feet above the grass where it had stood just seconds before. The black shape, which I thought more of as a cloud, began twisting in the air, forming a new creature. Red eyes peered out of the cloud and stared directly at me. Then, I saw my wife in the black mist. The next thing I saw was Eric. Then, it was the Eagle Bird blowing to pieces. A succession of random objects followed. What was once the Eagle Bird, shortly became the planet Mars, then the pod. I saw my wife walking through our garden. I saw the eyes again; they glared at me.
At that point, I got up and ran. I knew I had been spotted due to the red eyes looking in my exact position, so I felt there was no need to conceal myself anymore. Staying there and watching that morphing black cloud was a death warrant. I had no other option but to run back to the pod, but then, halfway through running, I remembered seeing the pod in the black cloud. Did it know where the pod was? Also, did it know about Eagle Bird blowing up? It couldn’t have; it was just a horse. But was it?
There is nothing more to say. I made it back to the pod, and I waited to see if the horse would follow. I sat outside the pod for an hour, staring at the hills, but it never came. Eventually I went back inside the pod, and now, I am writing this. As I write, I wonder what the hell the beast is. It’s still out there. I can feel it.
I now put down the notebook so I can watch for the dreaded beast. I don’t know if it will come or not. Wait. I hear a noise. I’m going to investigate.
***
I am sure that what Captain Edgar Parry heard was the horse. Although I do imagine that the horse was outside the pod that fateful night, I’m unsure if the horse was real. Perhaps Edgar Parry, frightened and hysterical from landing on Zorgen alone, hallucinated the horse and the black cloud that he described. Edgar Parry seemed like a smart and acute individual, but it is not unheard of that smart, wise individuals can crack under pressure. Pressure was exactly what Captain Parry was dealing with. Perhaps the horse was only a figment of his imagination. But then again, I’m not sure. I do know that the horse was definitely outside in his mind. Therefore, I believe the horse was there.
The United Territories of Earth eventually landed on Zorgen with something other than a pod. Otherwise, how could I be in possession of this journal? The space program launched another Eagle Bird- Eagle Bird V- that was completely destroyed for unknown reasons. The third time was when we got it right, launching Eagle Bird VI. Upon landing, the crew did not know that Edgar Parry had survived the Eagle Bird IV explosion, but after five years on the planet, the crew came across his pod. I can only imagine what they thought when they came across a manmade object.
The crew read the journals and tried to hunt for the horse Edgar Parry described, but they came up empty handed. For several years, I commanded the crew to search for this beast, but every time, there was nothing to be found. All that is left of Captain Parry is the pod; his body was also never found. Nonetheless, I still tell the crews to keep a watchful eye just in case the beast returns. I am still skeptical, but I believe Captain Parry was still a somewhat sane man even though he was under an immense amount of pressure.
It’s just too bad his legacy will not be able to live on, for I cannot release this journal to the public. I hope that someday I will be able to, but for now, his journey to Zorgen is a secret that is yet to be known.
Hand to Hand
by Gerald Arthur Winter
An excerpt from
The Artisan
a novel in progress
With three mouths to feed and another on the way, Chet got a draft exemption
in 1942 by working for the Department of Defense using his draftsman skills rather than
bearing arms against the Axis powers of Italy, Germany, and Japan. Though Chet never
gave much thought to his drawing skills, something that just came naturally, when World
War II ended, the late ’40s provided a window of opportunity. Though photography was
the media of the future as demonstrated by the black-and-white photo covers of Life
Magazine, illustrated renderings would remain the mainstream medium of advertising
through the mid ’50s.
Chet had taken his father’s advice after college—“If you want to get ahead in this
world, start by marrying a redhead. She’ll light your fire to success.”
Chet’s wife, Lilly, may not have been the Lucille Ball, flaring redhead that Chet’s dad
had in mind, but Lilly’s auburn coif ignited a passion for Chet that made her proud of him.
Work was hard to find with so many veterans returning from war, so Lilly checked the
Want Ads for Chet while she kept their three-year-old son out of mischief and nursed their
newborn daughter.
At his drawing table in their small apartment in Queens, Chet worked on his portfolio
of illustrations from appliances to food, drink, clothing, and cigarettes. His rendering of a pack of Lucky Strikes was his pièce de résistance featuring his understanding of perspective,
color, and lettering. But it wasn’t until an art director at Grey Advertising looked at his port-
folio presentation and posed a question that sparked Chet’s brilliant future.
“Where have you been working?” the art director asked Chet. “Your work is as close
to photographic as I’ve ever seen. How come I’ve never heard of you?”
“I’ve been doing catalog work from home the past year,” Chet said.
“Catalogue work?”
“You know, in Sears Roebuck, refrigerators, dishwashers, and the like. But I prefer
the bras and panties section,” Chet said with a wink that made the art director grin.
“Do you prefer to freelance or are you looking for a salaried position?” he asked.
“If I were single, freelance would suit me better, but I’m married with two kids, so a
salary would appeal to my wife to remove the uncertainty from our future. Lilly saw your ad
in the paper for an illustrator and got me this interview with you.”
“I need someone in our art department as soon as possible. Can you start now?”
“Well, I—” he started to stall, but Lilly’s face hovered in his mind. “I haven’t had lunch
yet.”
“We’ll order out . . . on me. Does pastrami on rye with mustard sound good?”
“That would be swell. Thanks—?”
“I’m Hal. What’re drinking?”
“Coffee’s good. Black—keeps me sharp.”
Hal escorted Chet through the “Creative Department” and introduced him to the
guys in the bullpen who made mechanicals for engraving guidelines and used a photostat
machine the size of a Chevy coup to make quick cheap copies of illustrations or photographs
for art directors’ visuals for print ads. TV hadn’t made its mark for advertising yet with less
than ten percent of homes having a television. There were no women in the bullpen. The
only women Chet had seen were receptionists on each floor as you came off the elevator
and as personal secretaries for the main department heads of Sales, Copy writing, and Art.
“We have a Pall Mall ad coming up this week and the copywriter wants to show a
man’s hand lighting a woman’s cigarette with a Zippo lighter. Time to show America that
the war’s over and it’s safe to have kids—lots of kids—ya know, like a Baby Boom.”
Chet gave Hal a no sweat shrug of confidence.
“Problem is I need finished art by tomorrow noon for client approval and the
deadline to get to the engraver without paying overtime is five o’clock tomorrow night.”
Chet gave Hal a look of confusion.
“Can do. But I was just wondering why you’ve got so many other men reading the funny
papers at their drawing boards? Why do you need me if you’ve got a deep bullpen with guys
lounging around with their thumbs up their butts.”
Hal laughed, giving Chet a pat on the back. “I knew I was gonna like you when you made
that crack about preferring to draw panties and bras. No BS, just straight to the point, which is
how I promise to be with you. These guys all lack one talent that only you’ve demonstrated in
your portfolio. You can draw hands, men’s and women’s, which have expression.”
“Can’t any of these other artists draw hands?”
“None like you can, Chet, so get to work and ask me for anything you need.”
Chet went to his cubby hole and arranged his palette. Within the next hour he had
a rough pencil sketch of a woman’s hand holding the cigarette between her index and
middle finger. There was a subtle profile of the woman’s pursed lips at one end of the
cigarette and the Zippo lighter’s flame at the other end. The man’s hand holding the lighter
with the expertise of a WW II vet showed a rugged masculine assuredness compared to the
slender grace of the woman’s smooth hand with long, but unobtrusive fingernails.
“I want to imply that she’s a doll,” Hal had instructed, “but not whore.”
Within two hours Chet was knocking on Hal’s open door that said “CREATIVE DIRECTOR.”
“I’d like you to approve the direction I’ve taken in my preliminary sketch,” Chet said.
Hal was on the phone and waved him closer and nodded for Chet to angle his sketch
towards the afternoon light from the window facing Madison Avenue from the 7th Floor.
“Hold on a minute,” Hal told his caller then his mouth dropped open. “Jesus, Chet!
That’s fantastic. I wouldn’t change a goddamn thing, but now I need the finish in color for
tomorrow.”
Chet nodded then as he went out the door he heard Hal say to the party on the
phone, “You’re gonna love this fuckin’ ad. I just hired an illustrator who nailed it.”
From 1948 to 1952, Chet’s commercial illustrations for top advertising print ads made
him a fortune with his special talent to render expressive hands. He didn’t stay on salary more
than a year before a demand for his expertise made freelance work more profitable than ad
agency bullpen assignments, even for clients paying $100,000 for a full-page color ad in top
magazines from The Saturday Evening Post to Playboy.
In the summer of ’48, Lilly told Chet, “You could eliminate the middleman, Honey.
Sure, this has been a great year for us, fifty thousand dollars and two weeks paid vacation,
but if you worked as a freelancer for hire, you could name your price, maybe earn as much as
the Yankees pay Joe DiMaggio.”
Chet said with a shrug. “But DiMaggo makes as much as President Truman.”
“With your talent, you could draw Harry Truman’s hand giving the middle finger to
Governor Dewey and everyone would know it was your creation. You have style, Baby.”
“I doubt that,” Chet said humbly.
“I made a call this morning, Chet. The Democrats are willing to come up with five
thousand dollars if you give them finished art for mass production by Friday—five grand!
Lilly flashed her green eyes and fluffed her shoulder-length coif recently died as
orange as Lucille Ball’s. She could afford a weekly manicure as well with Chet’s current
salary, but she wanted more. Chet realized his father was right about marrying a redhead.
What did ole Pop say? “Your gal Lillie’s got pizzazz! Marry her before someone steals her.”
Lilly followed through with her political advice and Chet quit his salaried job and
made the deadline for the Democratic Party, but better judgement blocked releasing the
artwork into circulation. Even though it was a perfect expression of the Truman legacy
that followed, censorship demanded that the illustration be destroyed along with any
rough sketches Chet had made in preparation for the finished art. Thanks to Lilly’s
negotiations with the DNC, Chet was still paid five grand for his effort.
Then Lilly told Chet to demand another $5,000 if his work was destroyed. He got
anothert $7,000 from the DNC to remain silent when the GOP started sniffing around
over rumors of Chet’s artwork’s existence. It was Chet’s first freelance contract, but to
protect the paper trail from scrutiny, Lilly did the billing simply referring to the artwork
on Chet’s invoice as the “Hand Job.”
When President Truman went to sleep on Election Day in 1948, Thomas E. Dewey had
been declared the victor. When he woke the next morning Truman learned, as the rest of the
nation had, that he had four more years as President. A Centennial celebration for the DNC
ensued.
Chet was later approached by GOP ancillaries. They asked Chet to reproduce duplicate
art so they could say it was the original illustration to discredit President Truman during his next
term for his vulgarity. Despite their offer of $10,000, Lilly declined in Chet’s behalf because,
now as his agent, she said he’d be too busy for the next four years working out of their home
in Connecticut to meet the illustration demands of five Madison Avenue advertising agencies
paying a combined total of a million dollars. Chet, Jr. and his sister Carol would be going to Ivy
League colleges.
With Lilly arranging Chet’s schedule and handling his billing, they rode on the gravy train
between New Canaan and Grand Central Terminal for the next ten years, but by the late 1950s
photography had become more cost effective with advanced means of reproduction. Eastman
Kodak took advantage of leadership in photo technology reproduction that challenged
commercial illustrators to lower their charges to ad agencies who were employing staffs of
a new breed of what Chet called pseudo artists—photo retouchers.
Chet was among a few fortunate artists who’d had a wife like Lilly to discipline him by
putting aside ten percent of his earnings into savings and investments. When demand for his
talent declined and was replaced by photographers and retouchers, Chet and Lilly could still
continue their lifestyle after their children had families of their own.
The unexpected often catches us short in life as was the case for Chet when Lilly died
in her sixties. Widowed at age seventy, Chet had no one to come home to from Manhattan
to Connecticut at night, so he sold their home for twenty times what they’d paid for it in 1950,
and rented a one-bedroom apartment on the eastside of mid-town Manhattan where most
of his working adult life had been spent in great demand for his artistic talent.
I ran into Chet in Manhattan on my way to The Studio Bar on Second Ave near the
adjoining corner of 44th Street near McCarthy’s Steakhouse and The Palm, which were too
rich for my blood as photo retoucher in a sweatshop studio typical of the ’60s. I was taking
a sandwich my wife had made for me that morning to have my lunch at the United Nations
Plaza where I could watch the East River water traffic in the park filled with flowers and
a bright patch of green grass to offset all the concrete and steel of New York City.
I’d just come through Grand Central Terminal toward Lexington Avenue but took
the short cut through the lobby of The Graybar Building so that, as instructed by my elderly
friend Chet’s wife to him a decade ago, “People will assume you’re working for J. Walter
Thompson in that building, which will raise the price of your artwork.”
So far that hadn’t worked for me, but I was only in my twenties that day when I saw
Chet coming out of Schrafft’s restaurant. He’d had his two martinis up and the fish platter.
He’d stopped eating red meat on doctor’s orders the year before, but had said to me at the
time, “Without Lilly, life is still worth living, but only if I can still have my two martini’s at lunch.”
Chet provided a wealth of wisdom for me in my early years working in Manhattan with
a commute from north Jersey. I was just an apprentice photo retoucher at Rialto Studio at the
time I met Chet with his bowties and suspenders and metal clips on his forearms to keep the
watercolors from getting on his starch-crisp, white dress shirts. He also wore a full denim apron
to protect his chest and lap from paint spatters so he’d always look his best in Schrafft’s. I’d
kidded him once, asking, “Do you think you might meet another redhead at Shrafft’s?”
I’d felt bad about the question when Chet got teary-eyed and said, “Lilly was my one
and only everything, not just a redhead. You know the cliché about there always being a strong
woman behind a great man. She was my tigress in animal kingdom of Manhattan. I called her
Tiger Lilly.”
I’d never kidded him about anything personal again, but he did have a sense of humor
about the profession that had made him rich and independent.
Chet said, “If I was asked by my relatives or highbrow Connecticut friends in the bar
car heading home about what I did for a living, I gave them the honest answer—I play the
piano in a whore house.”
He taught me to never sell my talent short, saying, “The best way to get a raise is
quitting to work for the competition. Your former employer will pay twice your salary if
you come back. If you stay in the same studio where you began, you’ll always be considered
just a beginner. Good fortune loves a moving target.”
Chet learned a lot from Lilly over the years. As an artist for detail he was a keen
observer. He didn’t just have his nose to the drawing board all day. He negotiated his
own deal with Rialto Studio for a four-day work week, unheard of at the time. Although
he couldn’t earn the kind of income he had in his prime, nothing close that, on an hourly
basis, he was the highest paid artist on staff because his work looked as realistic as a
photograph, which was in great demand at the time approaching the ‘70s on Madison
Avenue.
“The world has a way of stealing from you over time,” he’d told me. “What’s the
in-thing today is tomorrow’s garbage.”
Chet was right because the photography technology brought with it the demand
to work with chemicals rather than with watercolors on photographs. The Kodak dye-
transfer era of the ’80s required “bleach-and-dye” application on photos. Chet called it the
“bleach or dye” movement in photographic illustration. The need for his painterly talents
rapidly diminished.
“I’m like a silent film star after 1927,” Chet said. “Obsolete.”
The last time I saw Chet was 1988. In his nineties, he was just a shadow of the man
I’d known. I was in my professional prime as a bleach-and-dye photo retoucher with a
full-page ad in THE CREATIVE BLACK BOOK and a penthouse apartment to work from off First
Avenue. My studio was a nine-iron chip shot from the United Nations Plaza where I used have
a sandwich from home for lunch in the park. Now I could entertain my own ad agency clients
at The Palm for lunch or The Billy Munk Pub around the corner for my lesser clientele. The
food was great there, too, but the ambiance included Irish waifs with bedroom eyes that
beckoned for more than a tip. There were always a few choice redheads in the mix, but I
had my own at home.
I called Chet just to chat during a slow spell and he came up to my studio to meet
the seven other photo retouchers who worked for me. He brought a package under his arm
in a large, flat envelope the size of a 20” x 24” dye transfer photo.
I showed him some of our recent work and he just nodded silently with his chin
resting on his fist. He said nothing about the package he was carrying so I finally asked,
“Whatcha got there, Chet? You back to freelancing? If we get busy again soon I’ll give you
a call. I can always find a job for someone with your gift.”
“Thanks, but I’m done with working,” he said. “Before I show you what’s in the
package, you ought to read this article in The New York Times from yesterday.” He took
a crumpled page of newsprint from his suit jacket, handed me the article, then straighten
his bowtie.
The article was about a computer called the Sci-tech machine, which could retouch
photos by the use of pixels, computer units that can create image details and color variations.
The claim of the article was that this technology would replace both photographers and
retouchers who didn’t adapt and learn the new digital process.
I just shrugged then handed it off to be shared by my staff. “You don’t really think
we can ever be replaced by computers . . . do you?” I asked Chet.
“You might be in the same position I was thirty years ago—a silent movie star,” Chet
warned. “You have to put all things in perspective.” He motioned for me to open the large
envelope he’d brought with him.
As I unwrapped the package and set the artwork on our presentation table where art
directors viewed finished photos ready for engraving, Chet took me aside and told
e aside and told me the story behind the artwork.
“I want you to have this as a reminder to you years from now that nothing lasts forever.
The world is in a constant flow of change, sometimes for the better, sometimes not, but change
just the same. Though human, hand to hand we must pull each other up the food chain of the
animal kingdom. Only at the top can we look back to see how far we’ve come to survive. My
rendering is yours to do with as you wish, but I’ve kept it hidden for over seventy years and
now I’m ninety-five. The most I was ever paid for my talent was not to produce this illustration.
I trust you’ll keep it hidden as I have, but will remember the story I’ve told you about it. Think
of my gift to you as my hand to your hand.”
“So you didn’t destroy the original illustration in 1948 after all?”
“I had to give them the destroyed art to get paid, but Lilly thought it would be wise
for me to paint another one from scratch for insurance—redheads—go figure.”
I nodded in agreement as he departed. I never saw Chet again other than reading
his obituary at age one hundred in The New York Times. He’d survived his wife and both
children and his commercial illustrations had been compared to Norman Rockwell’s work.
What I think of most when I remember Chet, aside from his lifetime marriage to “Tiger Lilly,”
is that my bigger than life-size portrait of Harry Truman’s hand flipping the bird to Thomas E.
Dewey will be imbedded in my mind forever. Welcome to the jungle.
Lips Sealed
By Melodie Corrigall
Although they were sitting side by side she was as distant from him as she was from the animals at the zoo. Some scientists argued that other animal species could communicate with one another but Bimble doubted that was the case. As it was, she couldn’t even converse with this other type of human.
But there was no time for idle speculation. She had better act smart. Soon the hole in the fence, through which she had slipped, would be fixed. The menders were vigilant. They would already have reported the break in the barrier. At any moment, sirens loud enough to alert the forces on both sides would blare that a creature had broken through.
Naturally, they would not look as attentively on this side. The wild people often wanted to escape to her side but to date it was unheard of for an advanced person to come over here.
She had often wondered why the wild people wanted to come over to her side. Once there, they were unable to communicate with anyone and, when discovered, they were roughly returned to their proper place.
It was said that some did make it across, hid in back alleys and stole food to survive. Bimble had never seen one. Never, that was, until today. And that was not on the ordered side but on their side.
Curiosity had done her in or at least encouraged her daring decision to slip through the break in the fence. Curiosity compounded by grief at losing her uncle to the permanent third side. The side through which there was only one-way access—death.
The week, which now looked like ending in humiliation or imprisonment, had begun like any other. Every seven days, for as long as Bimble could remember, she had taken the SuperSpeed to visit her uncle.
Sadly, as she got older and stronger, her uncle got older and weaker. But until the last few seasons it had been a joy to visit him. Although his body was frail, his mind buzzed. He was the only one she could discuss taboo subjects with. The only one from whom she could find out about what it had been like before and how the future might unfold. He was the only one who never said bad things about the people who still talked with their mouths.
But today had not been like any other day. Today she had left the institute where her uncle had lived swimming in sadness, made worse by the grey rain-heavy sky.
It was unfortunate but no matter how advanced their technology, they could not control the sun and rain. The leaders insisted they were working on it and that and it was only a matter of time, but to date, the weather gods just did whatever they pleased and sometimes the result was unpleasant.
Perhaps sensing the future, that morning when she boarded the SuperSpeed, she had been so sad a man sitting next to her had messaged, “Perk up girl, today is good, and tomorrow is better.” The old folks, except for her Uncle, always said that but sometimes she wondered if that were true.
When she got to the door of her Uncle’s complex, the man at the door sent out a grey message, ‘He is not his old self today.’ That was an under-testimony she soon realized when she found her Uncle, prone on the bed, his arm hanging by his side.
“Bimble,” he communicated. “I was waiting for you.”
“I’m here,” she replied. “I’m always here on the seventh day.”
“But I won’t be,” he said and he sounded so small and miserable, she touched his hand.
“Be strong, be curious, do not be afraid,” he continued and then went silent. Immediately the alarms exploded and uniformed people burst into the room.
Before she could catch her breath, she was whisked into the hall and instructed to wait. She saw through the open door they were covering her uncle head to toe with a silver sheet and she knew that meant he was gone.
But she instead of waiting as they had instructed, she ran down the hall, and out the door. Dodging the people at the front entrance, she slunk around to the back of the property and scuttled towards the fence separating her uncle’s building from the wild county behind it. Then abandoned, she drifted along the barrier, her slender body shrunk in grief.
As she trudged along, her arm was roughly brushed but not with the excruciating zap she’d have experienced if she had tried to climb the fence. Like a drone her thoughts kept circling to the same place where suddenly she was alone. Her parents, who she seldom saw, were somewhere in another continent or maybe another planet. She couldn’t remember their agenda. The only one she had loved and felt tied to, her uncle, had left her.
She stared across the fence at the wild country beyond. In the distance she could see aliens doing something with the vegetation. She knew that this was where the products they ate, in a powdered state, came from but she was not sure about the process. On the ordered side, there was nothing living or green, such things were far too dangerous. As far as the eye could see, the vegetation moved in the breeze. It was almost beautiful but, of course, unkempt.
Suddenly the thin tingle in her hand stopped. Looking down she discovered a hole ripped open in the fence. Not a big gap, only large enough to let one of them come through. Or, she surprised herself to consider, to allow her to cross over.
What if she did slip through? Her uncle had always instructed her to be brave. He was criticized for having the vision: knowing what was to be. Had he known she would find the hole and did he mean she should be curious and go through?
She looked around, there was no one within sight on either side, and there were no drones in the sky.
What was the worst that could happen? She could slip back in a minute if there was danger and if she was found they would say it was just an adventure or she hadn’t known what she was doing.
Glancing furtively in all directions, she crouched and slipped through the hole, careful to avoid touching the metal. And there she was.
She stood and looked around. It was like that old story about the little girl Alice on drugs but she was quite clear-headed. She moved forward slowly. The field was not as wild as it had looked from the other side. There seemed to be some order. There was a pathway between the green stalks; the tall poles swayed high above her head. In a few minutes, she came to a path that veered off. A creature—an alien—jumped out at her. She was caught. They stood frozen and frightened, inspecting one another.
She sent a message “I am only visiting. I will not hurt you.”
He opened his huge mouth and a sound came out but, of course, she had no idea what it was messaging. The noise was much different than that of the little alien she had been shown at the learning center.
They stood for a long time and then started to circle around one another. Bimble moved backwards searching for the path to the fence, anxious to get back to her side and quickly. In her struggle to escape, she stumbled against a large green stalk.
The creature, bobbed up and down, and jutted out a hand. What did he want? Would he try to burn her?
He turned and signaled for her to follow. Too confused and lost to do otherwise she did so. When they turned the corner there was a bench in front of which was a mass of flowers, like in the market but not tied together, just flowing like an ocean of color. So many, hundreds all stuck in the ground.
He, for he seemed to be a he, bobbed a few times and sat down. His large red mouth, so soft looking, made a strange movement, and he touched the bench. Was she to be seated?
A strong intoxicating perfume drifted from the field; the flowers moved as if dancing. The smell made her dizzy. Why did they not tell her that flowers could be in the ground like this? Somehow, they appeared more beautiful than in a glass container.
The two of them sat there for some time. Bimble looked at her reminder and saw that her uncle had only been dead for three units but she felt she had lived much longer since his demise. She was having such an adventure.
But if it were three units then the menders would be coming along soon to check the fence and then there would be the sirens and they would immediately seal the gap.
She had better find her way back. Maybe the alien would help her but how could she ask for help? They didn’t understand brain messages only their loud noisy language.
He was sitting there quietly, the sun reflecting on his face, his head nodding. Maybe that meant something. She felt a sort of peace, a stillness, as if she had moved to another kingdom where even flowers communicated.
What if she stayed? Would he help her? Would he make her powdered food to sip through her mouth straw?
The sun was warm on her face as she sank into a gentle comfort. She would just settle beside the alien for a short while and then decide.
A Sight To See
By Leah Moynihan
The sun pelted down, like an oven heating the carcass, baking it. The odour climbed into my nostrils and made my stomach churn. I recoiled from the giant in the sand but the crabs did quite the opposite. Their red armour glistened as they devoured their prize. They climbed up the mountain of rotten flesh, battling one another. The winner scuttled to the top, his large claws raised in victory. The losers had to be satisfied with the scraps. It was a deadly battle but the trophy didn't seem to mind. He just slumped there, decaying and half buried in sand. His glassy lifeless eye stared at me, the other one missing and leaving a hole in the side of his fearsome head. His rough grey skin was caked in dried blood, deep cuts drawing patterns from where the nets clawed their way into him, trapping him and leading him to his sorry state.
I knew everything there was to know about the local wildlife, but I had never once imagined a shark washing up on our shore. I had only ever seen the predators on television and narrated by David Attenborough's calm voice. Yet, even drained of life, the shark looked terrifying with his knife like teeth protruding from his pointed snout. Beneath the scavengers that were already enjoying their free meal, I could just make out his gills. They were like lines carved into his neck. Fascinated, I asked my father about the fish’s anatomy and he explained that gills help the sharks to get their oxygen. They have to keep moving to breath. I was only eight but I was smart enough to know that the net tangled around his fins and body wouldn’t have allowed him to do this. Salty tears welled in my eyes, either from the rancid smell of decaying flesh or the fact that such a beautifully fierce creature died so savagely.
That evening, my father went down to the villages little pub to have a drink with friends. He enjoyed talking to the old fishermen, they were always the best storytellers. This particular evening, the topic of conversation was ,of coarse, the shark that washed up over night. One of the fishermen at the bar, probably after having had a few too many drinks, jokingly admitted to my father that the shark died because of him. I was retold the tale the next morning and it felt like a whole ocean was churning inside my stomach. He explained to me that the fisherman got the shark caught in his net and he was unable to cut him loose. The shark was too tangled so the fisherman had to let the net go with the shark still in it. As a little girl, my heart broke. To me, the fisherman didn’t even care. He seemed proud in fact, swirling his pint glass around, glad to be the centre of attention. In my mind, he sounded exactly like every villain and tyrant in my story books. He was just upset that he lost a good net.
The shark’s body had to be buried under the sand because the sea wouldn’t take it back. A digger came tumbling down onto the beach to do the job and all of the other children were excited to see such an impressive piece of machinery. I didn’t want to watch. Nobody seemed to care that an innocent animal was just killed. The shark suffered and nothing was being done to bring anyone to justice. Nothing was even uttered to the fisherman, who made no attempt at hidding his achievement. He got away with a crime and I couldn’t comprehend why.
That was the first time I had experienced humans carelessness towards the lives of animals. But it wasn’t the last. Over the years, I’ve seen too many seals appear washed up on the rocks, my favourite animal. I will never forget the one that stole my heart. The waves rolled up like carpets, reaching up to touch the sky, until gravity took hold and sent them tumbling back down to earth. The sea whispered my name, calling for me to enter the wild cold water and never let my feet touch land again. The sun was beating down and I decided to go surfing, like I did every morning. I paddled back out, after catching a few good waves when I spotted something unusual. At first, I thought I was hallucinating. It looked like a person but then it would duck down into the depths and pop back up to the surface a few minutes later. I had always loved mermaids and it sure did look like one from afar. Intrigued, I paddled closer and spotted the little head bobbing just beyond the breakers. She stared at me curiously, not letting her big brown eyes lose site of me. The seal tilted its little head sideways as if to survey me. My heart pounded rapidly in my chest. Time stood still. We stayed like that, staring at one another, somehow understanding. Two souls met, I never saw anything so magical.
One month later, I was diving with my friends in our usual spot, when I smelt it. As black as tar, wedged between two rocks where it must have dragged itself, a seal. A weak later we found a malnourished seal pup that had no way to survive without its mother.
The year after that there was a dolphin covered in fatal lacerations from a boats propeller and then, an otter drowned in a crab net with the cold look of fear never leaving it’s glassy eyes.
Ever since that shark on the beach, my view of the world has been turned upside down. That was the moment eight year old me realised that the world isn’t as perfect as I thought it was. I still don’t understand how the fisherman could laugh at his act, how someone could steal a seal pups mother, how someone could kill a dolphin and walk away.
Animals remind us of how cruel humans can sometimes be. A wolf attacks only to protect itself while humans can just be cruel. I have learned that animals somehow have a complex simplicity to them. They live to survive and survive to live, no pointless drama. They have a kind of warmth that the human race seems to have lost. Animals don’t have time for bitterness or hate. They know what they have to do, they know their purpose. They have no ambitions, only to care for their loved ones and that’s where their beauty lies. They don’t destroy, only create. They aren’t selfish, malicious or enjoy watching others suffer. Some would say that’s due to their low intelligence but I believe it’s quite the opposite. They have a kind of loyalty that is unbreakable. We sit back and watch while we cause destruction, just like the fisherman with the shark. We just sit and watch our house burn. But I have not given up on the human race yet. Animals also remind us of the good in us as well. I’ve seen people fight their whole lives to set up animal reserves, to stop overfishing, to change the way people see nature and save lives. We should be proud of what we will do instead of ashamed of what we were too afraid to do. If that one fisherman saved that one shark, if one fishing company hadn’t caught above it’s quota and left some fish for the seal, if one country made its waters protected, then, perhaps we can still make a difference. Perhaps a little girl in the future won’t have to see animals washed ashore because of people’s mistakes, perhaps she will see an ocean that has never been more alive and thriving beside humans. Perhaps she will spot little brown eyes staring at her in the waves and think it’s mermaid too.
Exoskeletally
By Meg Smith
Meg Smith's new poetry books, Dear Deepest Ghost
and This Scarlet Dancing, are available on Amazon!
I awoke and my room was a gray mass.
A thought of John, like some angry, sparking flame, erupted and died.
I remembered clearly: it's Tuesday.
My throat ached with a queer sort of pain, almost as if I had swallowed a thousand thistles.
John. I did not see him in my mind this time, but instead breathed in a hot slash, anger of my own.
My narrow dresser is across from the footboard, and above it a mirror, with some photos of friends tucked into the corners.
A gaudy lei of plastic yellow flowers. Not from John. Not even from anyone whose name I could place.
The gray began to clear. I arched forward with a start, and that odd pain crackled in my midriff.
I froze. I could see the top of my head, my face, in that dust-smeared mirror.
It was the face of a giant cockroach.
Or, some other insect. I don't know.
I'm not an expert on insects.
But maybe I should be.
Large, round eyes, like polished globes.
Imagine, your mouth opens from both sides, not up and down, and somehow, it's not weird.
Unless you're looking in the mirror, tasting the fetid air with timid, probing antennae.
Antennae.
Any moment now I would wake up, my groggy, human self --
the moment did not come.
I was not stiff and stocky, like those superbugs in atomic age science fiction movies.
Oddly, I looked sort of graceful.
Perhaps it was because now I was wholly insect, and thus, felt perfectly okay with my insectitude.
There was a sharp tap on the door.
"Your Uber is here." My brother.
Yes, Uber. A year without a license, thanks to driving more-drunk John home one night.
He was gone, and so my was license, along with court costs, and Uber costs.
I can't go into work like this, I thought. I wanted to laugh.
But I no longer could.
I could get my phone, and facetime my boss, Arben, who was on an Uber streak, too.
Arb, I have a good excuse. I'm a giant freaking cockroach.
Assuming a tap from a segmented limb covered in dark, comb-like hairs, could get the phone to work.
The tap erupted in a bang.
"Hey genius, get going!"
"Piss off," I yelled, but no sound came out. Just a wretched creak from mandibles.
What good is being a giant cockroach if you can't insult people.
With some effort, I heaved myself up, and over. Please don't let me fall on my back, and lie there like a simp with my giant insect legs kicking in the air.
But I managed to land correctly, though my feet skidded a bit on the hardwood floor.
Now, what.
There's no use hiding this, I thought.
Insect logic.
That's why there are billions, and billions, all over the Earth.
I made a labored, ungainly lurching toward the door, before realizing I had no way of turning the knob. I hooked the end of one foot under, and pulled it toward me. It was uncomfortable, but it worked.
There stood my brother.
There stood my brother, white and gray with shock, almost delirium, his mouth contorted as if fighting between a shriek and a laugh.
Even if I could talk, I had nothing to say to him.
With another, segmented, hair-spike leg, I thumped him aside, and plodded down the hallway.
I remembered the story. Metamorphosis. We read it in English class.
A guy wakes up and he's a giant insect, like me. His family laughs at him, ridicules him, and when he dies, all alone, a dry, sad husk.
Well, not me, I thought. Or, it seemed that I thought.
If I was going to be spending the rest of my life like this, I would do it in style.
I know it sounds odd, but, they day before, I was a person, immobile, and deservedly so, because I made a stupid decision on behalf of an even stupider cause -- a dead-beat boyfriend.
I was living at home, with my brother, older than me and also living at home, quietly nursing a painkiller habit courtesy of our mom and her myriad, phantom ailments.
Today, none of that mattered. I had a whole new life to live.
Yeah, I was starting to dig it.
I have to learn to be an insect, I thought.
Then: I don't have to learn anything. I'm a gigantic, hungry insect, and people will piss themselves when they see me, and either faint, or get the hell out of my way.
I can ransack grocery stores, thunder in the streets, and --
I wondered, can I fly?.
Most insects have wings, right?
I shambled toward the front hall door, which was not quite as easy to open. Ungracefully, I bashed against it, which I instantly regretted, as a slight, wincing tear erupted in my otherwise unflawed, dark brown armor.
I vaguely heard something, and then no longer heard it.
I'm sure it was my brother, screaming, a scream caught between fright and absurdity.
If mom's out of Oxy, he'll really be screwed, I thought.
The door was open. The air outside was sharp, and cold.
Shit, that's right, another revelation blared in my insect brain. Most insects don't like cold.
For a moment, I mused whether I should turn back around and use my trusty, hooked feet to grab a blanket off the couch.
Then I thought how stupid I'd look, an enormous insect in a fuzzy blanket with bright orange daisies printed on it.
More than that, I wanted nothing, not one shred of my life in this sad, narrow space with those two sad, narrow people and my father's ashes in a bronze urn on the mantelpiece.
A blessed insect logic took over: Just go. We'll figure this out.
I had a hundred sensing places -- eyes, legs, antennae, and something wonderful, nameless and alive inside of me, all directing me where to go.
I had to squeeze through the door opening. It was pinchy-feeling, and I had to stop and start several times.
I'm insect and still overfed in the middle, my mind sighed.
One last, subtle push forward, and I was out.
A sound behind me. I sharp, shocking sound.
If I swiveled my insect eyes a bit, perhaps I could see what happened.
But I didn't have to. I knew.
My brother had shot himself.
I plodded unevenly down the steps, the cold from snow patches in the withered grass stinging my feet.
The door shut behind me.
I could fly.
I gimped around a bit; the snow and grass clung together in uneven lumps.
This sucks, I thought. It felt a hundred thousand times colder. It felt, sounded, tasted, so much colder.
Insects are alive with every sense, whether they like it or not.
They. Me.
I stood for a few moments, my limbs a little achy from holding up my weight. I did not want my belly touching the cold snow and grass.
My eyes scanned, from left to right, and slightly upward to bare trees against incongruously cheerful blue sky.
Our house was situated in the town common. The town common is pretty and historic.
A memory came of sitting there for the Fourth of July parade, but quickly evaporated.
I understood. My newly-minted insect brain was making short work of memories that no longer meant anything, had no real context for, well, an insect.
Now was the only certain reality.
Strangely, traffic moved smoothly, stopping at the lights where a knot of quaint New England roads tangled in a traffic engineer's worst dream.
No one was looking at me, at all, and if they did, they seemed not to register much.
Then, I saw one person raise a phone. He wants to photograph me, and share it with his stupid social media friends.
The ironically-named, Hive Mind.
His brakes screeched, just a miniscule space between him and sand truck in front of him.
Picturesque New England winters bring big, grouchy sand trucks.
This is getting me nowhere, my insect mind told me.
Looking at the traffic, I realized a new problem. People might get distracted and crash, but that was their problem.
My issue was getting from one place to another without getting crushed.
My glorious, arthropodic debut should not end in a glob of smeared goo on the road, under the wheels of a speeding minivan.
My brain ushered some thoughts -- snaps of electricity, really -- to the large, weighty, bifurcated shell I knew was covering my back.
They lifted, slightly at first. With each try, I grew a bit stronger, and they lifted higher.
Cold air flooded what I knew was beneath -- more dedicated, translucent wings.
Could I do this, a human doubt pondered. Could I get this big, chubby body off the ground?
A flick of memory. Someone, really toked up in John's house but not John, musing through a cough: "Man, bumblebees are too fat to fly."
The retort: also not John, who was passed out: "Dude, bees don't read physics."
Some coughing and laughter.
Why was I even thinking of this, why wasn't this banished with all other nonessential human thoughts?
Then, just as clear, bright and wonderful as the winter sky: "Shove your human physics. I'm going to fly."
My hooked feet dug into the unyielding, frozen grass.
I push back, and then forward.
Icy air filled my wings, and brushed my back.
I stumbled at first, but on the second push, I thrust out, and up.
Shove your physics, humans, my triumphant insect mind churled.
A great buzzing sound startled me at first. Then, of course. Air in my wings. That's why flies and bees make that noise, high and urgent, while bloodthirsty, corpulent horse flies utter a lower, sinister drone.
My insect family, I thought. I don't know if mandibles can grin, but if they can, that's what I was doing.
And, something else. I was flying.
The trees brushed me rudely as I ascended, but soon they were beneath me. A stray twig broke from the end of one branch, caught beneath my shielding upper wings and the more fragile lower ones.
It was annoying as hell, but after a moment, as I gained speed, the same cold, thinner air, pushed it out.
Back to gravity, fuckhead, I thought. To a twig.
To my brother, slumped in a bloody mass on the floor.
To my house, the door opened, but no one going near it.
Maybe they'll see, don't freaking go in there. A guy blew his head to mush, and a girl turned into a giant bug and flew away.
If insect mandibles could laugh, that's what I was doing now.
Below, perhaps, people were finally looking, pointing, wondering, calling police.
Who would laugh at first, and advise them to put on tinfoil hats.
A stranger at the door might be danger.
A magnificent, soaring girl-insect, was not.
She's up there, and she can't hurt you, the dispatcher would say.
Then, the dispatchers, to each other: Must be some party. All these people calling.
I bet it's a kite, a dispatcher would say. People did fly kites on the common, all the time. Dragons, butterflies, so, hey, a cockroach kite is weird, but not out of the question.
After all, smiling dollops of pooh were a thing. I had even looked out to see a smiling pooh kite.
So a cockroach -- or scarab beetle -- or whatever -- at least it's not flying pooh.
I was getting tired. The weight of my body, though in some ways porous and light, was taxing my wings, and even my tucked-in legs.
I was going to have to land.
I scanned the rooftops -- now turning a strange, but not unwelcome, gray-green, registering to my new, insect eyes.
All the same, I could see it, know it, perhaps by rote.
If only I could have flown to work like this all these years.
Work.
It was not a whole thought in my mind, but something imprinted by pattern, repetition. You go to the same place five days a week for seven years, and that happens.
I had no introspection. I don't really think most insects sit around on flowers, or garbage heaps, pondering the meaning of anything except perhaps that it's great to be an insect.
Fly, eat, bite people, or sting them, send them running at the slightest angry wing-hum. Just don't get eaten by birds, or stepped on.
And neither was a risk to me.
I'm an insect. With benefits.
It was the last, whole thought I could feel as a human, and it tasted unpleasant, because it was a human thought.
The place that harbored the remnants of human thought was dying.
But I was alive.
There was an atrium on the roof of the building -- a sorry, delipidated corporate park.
Whatever, my insect brain pronounced.
I landed -- honestly, with much less grace then my takeoff. The roof was covered with pebbles, and I slipped, got one lodged between leg segments that refused to budge.
I kicked -- and finally, it broke free and fell on the rooftop, lost among its fellow pebbles.
The atrium would be warm. The winter sun would glide through the glass panels, shedding its love on the odd mix of real and artificial plants.
Only, there was no door.
Being an insect of well beyond normal size, this in itself was not an obstacle.
I jumped, stronger now, a bit, and pushed at the glass panes.
I felt a sliver of human surprise at how easily they caved.
I was inside.
Cold air was coming in, and glass was broken all over the poor real-fake plants, but I was in.
I floundered a bit, feeling like an escaped, bulbous balloon, bouncing against the intact glass pains, and along the waxy, foliage.
I'm here.
At work.
The window was broken.
I didn't care about the window.
I only cared about staying warm.
I folded myself neatly, compartmentally, and with perfect insect sensibility, into the warm spot, far on the other side.
The plants covered my underside nicely.
I glanced out, around and a bit downward, down at the reception area.
The building was half empty. They had trouble leasing the spaces.
Anyone who was there was probably inside their offices.
Someone would eventually discover the awful draft, the shards on the carpeted floor, and the outsized arthropod making itself at home in the office park greenery.
Someone. But insects are pretty much focused on now.
I went to sleep. Or, something like sleep. No dreams, though. Just an inert, perfect state of stillness.
I welcomed it.
If anyone had discovered me right away, really, they wouldn't be a threat.
My last conscious thought: I could snap their freaking head off in my mandibles.
The world turned into dusk, and overwhelming with calm.
Arbus Callen didn't like his name.
He didn't like his job.
He didn't like the sad atrium that looked like one in yet another dying shopping mall.
He felt like the last man on earth.
His one truly faithful employee,Sharon, hadn't come in.
He got worried. He called the police. He didn't understand why the dispatchers were laughing.
Things got pretty terrible after that.
Sharon was gone. Just, gone.
He called again. This time, he was told, we have a big situation going on. Please call back.
Something, about an incident, at a house.
Sharon's mother was at the ER, with nurses fitfully issuing naloxone, with no success.
The brother was drowning in his own scarlet pond.
And Sharon was gone.
Just, gone.
He sensed it, rather than knowing it.
He sat down on a chair in the lobby, and looked up.
I knew that would happen one day, he mused. Stupid cheap glass fitters.
He sat in the lobby, the chilly air trickling in, a stray scrap of cloud floating by.
Tragedy had hit a family he barely knew, apart from Sharon, peripherally.
And somehow, his world was turned over.
Arbus looked up again, and looked away.
And looked up again.
The leaves were rustling.
Great. With broken glass, sparrows and pigeons and squirrels will get in, fly in, fall in.
His head felt ready to burst. Blood thundered.
Why was he even sitting here.
Because home sucks, his mind answered him.
Home is empty. Home is always empty.
A strangely loud buzz, followed by some scratching, made him look up.
At first his mind told him: that's a blimp or some damn thing that fell through the whole. Or one of those stupid kites always getting away.
Except kites don't crawl on their own volition, up and over the staircase.
Stumbling, scratching, this absurd vision made its way down the stairs, to the lobby floor.
Arbus, still sitting in the chair, stared at it.
A terrible, knowing clarity flooded his brain.
"Sharon," he gasped.
He stood up, marvelling at the antennae, swinging to and fro, the intricate, hair-covered legs, the awesome shell. The armor.
Exo-something, the back of his mind said.
The eyes, the great, commanding, ever-seeing eyes.
He nodded, and a small smirk escaped his mouth.
He shook his head. Laughter was coming now, uncontrollable laughter.
"Damn, girl," he said aloud now. "Damn!"
The creature before him leaned just slightly forward, and its antennae danced with a new, frantic purpose.
"Damn!" More laughter, heard only by Arbus.
Another sound, unheard, filled the great open, sun-filled, foliage space.
It was a concise, muscular snap, as the sideways mouth, the robust mandibles, closed around his neck.
The snap lingered caustically in the air, without laughter.
A woman came out of the ladies' room and screamed.
Another came out behind her, and said, "What the actual --"
The rug was flooded with blackish blood, and a few fabric remnants.
One dandled just so, caught on a hairy, segmented leg.
A gathering was forming, but retreated, hugging the walls in terror.
Shaking hands reached for cell phones.
But not everyone's.
One man collapsed in fatal cardiac arrest into the artificial leaves.
A few people stood frozen, chilly urine on their pants leg or stockings the only thing signalling feeling.
A small band grasped at their composure, and burst through the door, outside into the frozen courtyard.
One of them finally managed to punch at a phone, to call for something -- anything.
Help.
Police.
The words did not come right away because they were so asinine.
"Get the hell over here!" someone finally yelled into the phone.
While all this happened, the insect, once known as Sharon, trundled over dead and fainted bodies, which registered no desire.
The antennae now leaned forward with purpose.
Parsing the wall. It was time to climb up it.
But this proved more of a task than anything had, so far.
The wall slid from beneath in a way that would have caused frustration to a human, just the day before.
Today, there was only movement and strain, until, finally, it proved too much.
It was followed by a weary lurch over the edge of the upper ledges of the atrium, now so much like a huge terrarium home to some exotic, displaced denizen.
Below was a mass of panic, shouting, swearing, running to and fro.
"Where did it go?" some bellowed in disbelief.
Yellow tape was going up. Someone was retching. More than one person.
But all this blurred into intangible noise, vibrations of disturbance.
These began to fall away.
A transformation was taking place, that no one below could see.
There was an opening, a yawn, even, from beneath legs, well worn by weight and so much epic exertion in so short a time.
In the shelter of the leaves, perfect, white, translucent lives were spilling out, out of the dark shelter that had ferried them from ground to sky to this green, hidden space.
Even if they could have projected anything like thought, they wouldn't have, and wouldn't have meant anything to their over-tired bearer.
Stillness covered stillness, and even the rhapsodic antennae began to curl downward.
In a white blur, they waited. They had nothing to do really, except wait, and grow, and change, as their genetic instructions had already bid them.
They didn't need to know what time it was. Their time would come.
Star-Crossed Lovers
by
Gerald Arthur Winter
Pulling up to the train station in the pouring rain, Sharon saw her husband Al running to
her Honda CRV. Al opened the door and his black umbrella blew inside-out—a dead bat with
limp wings. Sharon felt rain spray her right cheek as Al plopped into the passenger seat beside
her. The remnant smell of cigar smoke from the train’s bar car made Al’s soaked trench coat
smell like a wet dog. The wipers pumped blindly as he leaned towards Sharon for a kiss, but
his gin-tainted breath gagged her. She offered her cheek.
“How many martinis?” she asked.
“Three for lunch after the closing—big-ass client—then two more on the train home.
I was celebrating, so who’s counting, Babe? ”
She thought. When the hell have you ever called me Babe? You cheating bastard
—and now of all times and--
“What’s for dinner, Hon?”
Hon? She thought. Jesus, next you’ll be calling me--
Listen, Darlin’, I’m playing golf this weekend—an overnighter till late Sunday afternoon,
but I’ll be home in time for dinner . . . Giants are playing The Cowboys . . . can’t miss that.”
Her mind raced thinking, Listen, Darlin’ Honey Babe, you goddamn son of a bitch—but
she said, “Sure. You have yourself a good ole time, Sweetie.”
“Ya sure, Babe?”
“I know how much you need to unwind on the weekends, especially after you’ve been
stressed all week leading up to closing that big deal. Enjoy yourself,” she said, thinking . . . You
selfish prick.
“Thanks, Sharry,” he said, using a nickname he hadn’t uttered since they’d met in
college. He leaned close. “Baby, you’re the greatest.”
She blocked him with her right arm. “Shall I send you a postcard from the moon?”
“From the wha—?”
“Ralph Kramden—The Honeymooners.”
“Oh, yeah, but I’d never hit you, Sharry.”
Not that you’d recall, she thought. You’ve always been too drunk to remember.
* * *
Across town, Bill didn’t work in Manhattan like Al. They weren’t so much friends
as sports dads who’d had kids on the same teams, a brotherhood that a decade later still
warranted mutual exchanges at the bagel shop: “How ’bout those Giants.” Aside from
occasional nods of recognition, they each knew little about the other.
On week nights Bill always pulled into the driveway by 5 p.m. His son was twenty
and his daughter nineteen, but his wife, Abby, had her social obligations from aerobics to
tennis. Her great love was coaching cheerleading for middle-school girls on Friday nights
under the lights and on weekend mornings. This allowed little chance for Bill and Abby to
have much face-to-face time.
Twenty years ago in the ’90s Bill and Abby had met as teachers in the same high
school system, but when their daughter was born, Abby had become a stay-at-home-mom,
because Bill was promoted to English Department Head with a huge pay hike. Athletic, and
a health nut, Abby was always on the go, and never home when Bill arrived at 5 P.M. Unlike
Abby, Bill had a nagging cough, a remnant of his former smoking days and suburban pollen
became progressively immune to his annually prescribed anti-allergens.
Abby’s nickname for Bill was “Wheezer.” Though deeply offended by that negative
moniker, he never complained, though Abby often had used it in front of the kids. He was
made to accept that he was a troll wed to a princess with no right to feel anything but lucky,
As his colleagues as well as Abby often reminded him—a non sequitur.
One evening, Abby told Bill, “I’ve got to be up by six tomorrow morning to make sure
the girls’ new cheerleading outfits fit.”
Reclined in bed, he shrugged.
“The game’s at eight o’clock across town,” she said, taking Bill in hand. She seemed
oblivious to her practiced ritual. There was so little time in her busy schedule. Her vigorous
hand motion looked as if she were playing craps rather than manually peaking his arousal.
“Seven come eleven,” he said, but Bill’s reference went over Abby’s head. She was
raised a strict Catholic and the closest thing in the house that resembled condoms were the
party balloons at the kids’ birthday parties when they were younger. Unless Abby was certain
her time was right, only giving him manual gratification was on Abby’s menu for Bill.
Bill had a good sense of humor, which often came to the surface in his senior English
classes, with asides to his hormone-driven students, who by law were men and women, but
only physically. Mentally they were starved for instant gratification and couldn’t wait for the
notch up from high school to college. Bill often wondered, if Abby hadn’t taken time to do her
manual rituals to please him, would he have succumbed to one of those nasty tabloid taboos
of teacher-students crossing over the line of decency?
Never happen, he thought, feeling confident with his litmus test, their neighbor, Mary,
a drop-dead-gorgeous seventeen-year-old from his school who often waved to him from her
adjacent backyard before her parents or Abby came home for dinner—a two-hour gap of
opportunity from 5 to 7 pm Monday through Friday. Though Mary had an obvious crush on
Bill since taking his English class, and often asked for extra help, he envisioned himself as
Pope William and she as the Holy Virgin. He vowed that never the twain shall meet, certainly
not in any conjugal sense.
Bill thought it was a question of balance, and about the town’s kids growing up in a safe
environment with a good education that could send them to college, resulting in respectable
careers and happy marriages of their own—the American dream.
Abby was an industrious woman, smart, great looking, and fit, though she was even
more mentally tight-assed than physically. On top of that, Bill loved his job educating teenagers
for college and life, an honorable profession with great bennies. With Abby so involved in town
sports activities, Bill still had time after grading papers to pursue his dream above and beyond
all that other stuff called life. As trite as it may have seemed, Bill had been working on a novel
that no one knew about, not even Abby. It was those words from his inner consciousness that
had become his private stash of literary narrative—fulfilling, reassuring, and often foreboding.
It was those unshared words, some quite dark, which spoke Bill’s truth from within. Rebellious
in college , Bill was ow in his 40s, he was merely a closet rebel against conformity. His steadfast
exterior made his students consider him conformity’s poster-boy.
* * *
Sharon offered her cheek to Al at the front door before he headed to his BMW
convertible with the trunk open and his golf clubs lying inside. His small carry-on was well
suited for a weekend of golf. A few changes of clothes on hangers in plastic bags from the
cleaners were laid flat across the backseat. Al was already dressed to tee-off. He told Sharon
the name of the upstate New York golf course where his foursome would be playing, but his
words were like a foreign language with no subtitles.
As she waved good-bye to Al, she wept, not because she’d miss him, but because she
wouldn’t. She couldn’t remember what it had felt like to miss him. Maybe before the boys
were born, a past life she longed to visit, but she had no GPS yet to show her the way.
* * *
Abby was asleep, so Bill crept to his den and pushed his stack of students’ homework
aside and took his manuscript draft from a secret desk drawer. He shuffled the pages back
to the beginning of the last chapter and began to read forward to get himself back into the
rhythm of his narrative. His novel was about a woman in a bad marriage based loosely on a
woman he’d often seen in various situations in different parts of town. Bill knew nothing
about her real life, whether she was happily married, a widow, or even divorced.
He never tried to pair her with any real man in town because, in his mind, she was his
devout lover. This nameless woman served only as a physical manifestation of his fictional
character. Bill was the stand-in for a man she secretly loved. He’d reached the point in his
novel where he felt compelled to speak to this woman the next time he saw her in the
checkout line at Shoprite or the drive-thru at the bank.
Though Bill feared that the sound of the woman’s voice might shatter his fantasized
image, breaking the spell that he’d conjured of their passionate affair, he’d begun to long for
her intensely. Abby’s metronomic hand releases had become tiresome. Bill needed fulfillment,
but beyond just sexual gratification. He wanted someone with whom he could share his inti-
mate thoughts. With a Pygmalion fixation, he needed his mystery woman to come to life in
his embrace.
In his mundane life, Bill was ashamed of himself for wanting this newfound passion
outside his daily routine, which for years he had felt lucky to have with such a good wife and
mother as Abby. For some time, just writing about the mystery woman had been satisfying
enough, and his anticipation of possibly seeing this woman in town worked better to arouse
him than promised by Viagra TV commercials. He began to plot a way to find this woman.
For starters, maybe he could attach a name to her by sidling up to her at the bank to watch
her write a deposit slip. He might see her name on the deposit slip or on a check she was
depositing. Maybe he’d see her address on the slip and follow her home. Just the thought
of having her address at hand aroused him.
With his own busy schedule, he wasn’t able to sit idly by waiting for her to show up
on his radar. He drove slowly through the strip malls and around the Shoprite parking lot. He
nearly had a couple of fender benders from the distraction of looking around and checking
all his mirrors. He hadn’t seen her in at least a month, so his mind raced, wondering if she’d
moved out of town or had gone away on vacation with her family. Even if she had, Bill knew
there could be no substitute for this woman. She’d begun as the woman in his novel, but
now she was the woman of his dreams, and no one else could ever do.
Even if Abby could somehow, through metamorphosis, transform into the woman in
his novel, that would no longer satisfy him. Abby wouldn’t be that “she” of his secret novel.
Then it happened. In his side-view mirror, he saw the woman getting out of her car
and walking towards the entrance to the bank. She held a paper slip. Bill hit the brakes and
quickly tried to park, but almost hit another car vying for the same space.
“What are you doing here?” the woman driving the other car asked, rolling down her
window. “I thought you had to go to the library this morning.” It was Abby with a carful
of eleven-year-old cheerleaders. He felt like a twelve-year-old caught masturbating by
his mother. His face flushed with shame.
Abby looked like a stranger to Bill. His mind was fixed on the other woman. He
needed to see what she’d written on her deposit slip. He’d have to find a way to speak to
her, to learn something about her—anything.”
“Bill?” Abby called to him. “Are you OK?”
“Forgot to pay the electric bill,” he said. “Got to go to the bank before it closes.
See you tonight for supper!” he called to her and pulled into the space. He waved to her
and trotted towards the bank, but felt resentment towards Abby for interfering.
Abby shook her head with a frown and drove away.
Bill puffed from the short jog as he approached bank’s door, thinking, Wheezer.
* * *
Sharon felt a sense of urgency about cashing the check Al had given her to buy
groceries. She could’ve written her own check from the same account, or even from the
account Al was unaware of. It was her “just-in-case” stash, but she’d never had the courage
to ask herself—“Just in case what?” Al was such a control freak that she needed to create
her own space and accumulate the funds to build that wall of safety.
Her mind raced as she approach the entrance to the bank, then wondered if all her
daydreaming had made her forget to lock her car. She whipped around to go back and check
her Honda, but in that split second, a man coming towards her from behind slammed head
-on into her. The impact of her forehead against his face shattered his glasses and broke his
nose. Though Sharon’s head throbbed and her vision was blurry for a moment, she shook it
off and knelt beside the man to see if he was breathing.
Sharon’s CPR knowledge came to mind, so she began to push on his chest, which
seemed to have no effect, so she gave him mouth-to-mouth resuscitation. She hadn’t
kissed Al on the lips in over a year, but now something kindled inside her. The taste of
this stranger’s lips and the scent of his aftershave stirred feelings she’d thought might
be lost forever. When his lips reacted to hers, she pulled back and saw his eyes were
wide open. Both stared at each other with curiosity, each seeming somehow familiar
to the other, yet they were total strangers, who’d never spoken to each other before.
“Are you, okay?” he asked her.
She laughed. “Am I, okay? You might need an ambulance.”
He touched his fingers to his nose and winced. He looked at his bloody fingertips
and passed out. She shouted for someone in the bank to call 911 for an ambulance. As
she waited five minutes before an ambulance arrived, the growing crowd gathered around
them. She studied the man’s face. Though battered, his face seemed kind. She felt concern
for him in a way she didn’t understand. When she put her hand on his chest to be sure he
was still breathing, she heard a wheezing sound emit from his open mouth.
She closed his lips with two fingers. The sound stopped though his chest continued
to rise and fall. She wondered what his name was. She ran several common names through
her mind, including “Bill.” The one name that never came to mind, or ever would, was
“Wheezer.”
* * *
When Bill’s clouded vision focused, he was about to ask the woman her name, but
then he saw it was Abby and he was on a gurney in the ER. He wondered, had he dreamt his
encounter with the woman? Had he had a car accident trying to follow her in his car mirrors?
“Did I have a car accident?”
Abby furrowed her brow the same way she had when he’d asked her to marry him right
after college. “You were running,” she said, “trying to get to the bank before it closed.”
“Running? Yes, I suppose I was.”
“That’s good. So you remember. Maybe you don’t have a concussion,” she said.
“What day is it?”
“What day?”
She nodded.
“Saturday.”
“Good,” she said. “Maybe you’re okay.”
“How did it happen? Did I walk into a glass door at the bank?”
“You don’t remember?”
“Vaguely . . .”
“You slammed into this poor woman on the sidewalk outside the bank.”
“Oh . . . is she okay?”
“Yes . . . they released her hours ago.”
“Who was she?” he asked.
“She’s the wife of one of your sports dad friends in town,” Abby said with a shrug.
“Never saw her before . . . said she never goes to the games . . . only her husband does . . .
like you . . . coaching soccer and Little League.”
“Who’s her husband?”
“She didn’t say. Let me ring the nurse to see if a doctor can check you out of here.”
“I should apologize to her.”
“She had a bump on her forehead . . . no blood, not even a bruise. Good-looking but
a little spacey.”
“How do you mean?”
Abby shrugged. “Preoccupied, you know, like her mind was somewhere else when she
spoke. At first I thought she might have a concussion too, but they checked her out. She’s fine.”
“I’d still like to apologize to her.”
“She gave me her name and phone number in case we needed her to pay for your ER
bill. I told her your coverage would pay for it. She asked me to call her anyway to let her know
you were okay. Spacey, but a nice woman.”
“What’s her name?”
“She didn’t say, but she wrote her phone number on the back of her bank slip.”
“Let me see it.”
“I stuck it in sun visor in my car on the way here.”
“Save it for me,” Bill said. “I want to send her a note of apology.”
“She only wrote her phone number,” Abby said. “I wouldn’t call her. She might think
you want to sue her.”
“No need for that,” he said, but as he closed his eyes as if that would be the end of it,
he could think of nothing but the deposit slip in Abby’s car. The woman may have written her
phone number on the back of the deposit slip, but the printed side could show her name and
address.
* * *
When Sharon got home from the ER, she tossed her shoulder bag on the sofa and
exhaled a deep breath that blew a loose curl from the lump growing on her forehead. She
poured a glass of chilled chardonnay and took it to the master bathroom and drew a bath.
She lit several scented candles in the bathroom, turned on the speakers from the Dreamscape
cassette on the eight-track stereo, then lowered herself into the soothing hot water scented
with white tea. With her eyes shut, she thought about the man’s lips that had touched hers.
She ran the tip of her tongue across her upper lip and felt an ache deep within her to be kissed
by him again. She wasn’t sure if it was just her need for affection or some greater need for this
man in particular.
What an absurd notion, she thought. Who the hell is he anyway—just some school
teacher?”
Though Sharon had thought her brief conversation with the man’s wife would have
ended any further thought about the man the woman had called “Bill,” she couldn’t let go of
her attraction to him, though without any reason she could fathom. Her husband was more
universally attractive with that GQ-cover look. Al was successful and charismatic, but he drank
too much, and couldn’t stop his carousing at work, even after the boys were born.
In recent years, with a Friday night buzz, Al had said nonchalantly, “We can’t help
help it, Shar. We prowl . . . it’s what men do. Our boys will do the same.”
But not this man, she thought, not this guy Bill. If he ever cheated on his beautiful wife,
Abby—quite stunning and smart—it wouldn’t be just a casual affair. He’d be all in.
* * *
“Tell you what,” Bill said to Abby next morning. “Your car needs an oil change. Let
me drive you down to the mall where I left my car yesterday, then you can take my car to pick
up the cheerleaders. I’ll take your car for an oil change and a wash.”
Abby shrugged. “Sounds like a plan. Sure. Let’s go.”
The sun glared in his eyes through the windshield as he was driving with Abby beside
him, but his sunglasses had been left in his own car overnight. Bill didn’t wipe his watering
eyes for fear Abby might tell him to pull down the visor where she’d kept the mystery woman’s
bank deposit slip.
Abby gave Bill a peck on the cheek before getting out of the car. “See you for dinner,”
she said over her shoulder as she headed to Bill’s car.
Bill watched the gyrating of Abby’s hips in her tight white slacks through which the
morning sun exposed her thong panties. Abby was what his fraternity brothers in college
would have called a fine piece of ass, even now at forty-three she still was. Bill knew that all
of their friends and acquaintances in town saw him as the lucky one in their match-up.
“What is it that you like about me best?” he’d asked Abby, questioning his own worth
in their marriage.
“Comfort,” she’d said without thought. “You’re like a broken-in, comfy pair of slippers.”
She’d even given him a long kiss after saying that with a flutter of the tip of her probing tongue
as reassurance or just a tease. That had been several years ago, but he’d clung to her gesture
until yesterday before his mystery woman had given him mouth-to-mouth.
That’s all it was, right? He asked himself. I’m just imagining something more . . . some-
thing worth holding onto.
He put his hand between the sun visor and the car’s roof then anxiously slipped his hand
back and forth. He felt nothing. He pulled down the visor—nothing. His pulse pounded and he
began to cough and wheeze.
Fall pollen, he thought, knowing how the change of seasons brought his allergies out
of hibernation, often giving him anxiety attacks. His chest felt tight and he became somewhat
dizzy, which his allergist had said was pressure on his inner ears from the pollen buildup in his
Eustachian tubes. His hearing would be like swimming underwater for hours until his meds
kicked in. He kept a supply of his prescription in his glove compartment for such emergencies
. . . his glove compartment.
He’d worked Abby perfectly to set up this opportunity to meet his mystery woman with
all of Saturday afternoon free to find her and speak to her, and now he was instantly converted
into Wheezer, as if Abby had sabotaged his plan. She said she’d put the woman’s bank slip in
the sun visor, but she must have lied.
Lied? That’s crazy. Abby would never lie intentionally. She must have thought she’d
put it there, but had put it someplace else. Maybe she’d even thrown it away—unintentionally.
Bill pulled over on the shoulder on a quiet local street and got out of Abby’s car. He
moved the driver’s seat all the way back then squatted to look under the seat. He found some
loose change, a hair clip, a crumpled shopping list, and a comb with missing teeth. He took a
deep, painful breath that made his chest rattle. He unfastened the floor matt to look under it
. . . more loose change, a paper clip, and a candy wrapper—no deposit slip. Damn it!
Resigned to defeat, Bill got in Abby’s car and headed home where he still had some
of his meds in the bathroom medicine chest and a prescription for autumn renewal. It was
a cloudless day in the high 70s so he took the scenic route home across a high local bridge
between two mountains separated by a river below. Maple trees were beginning to show
some autumn colors with a few flashes of red and yellow among the green on the
mountainsides. He opened both front windows of Abby’s car, then the sun roof,
which made a whooshing sound crossing the bridge.
Despite the beauty of the day, Bill felt a sick feeling in his gut, but his peripheral
vision on his right side caught a fluttering motion above the passenger seat.
The sun visor, he thought. Not the driver’s, but the passenger’s sun visor.
Traveling at 60 mph over the bridge with a crosswind, the windows open, and his
sunroof sucking wind out the top of the car like the eyewall of a hurricane, the bank deposit
slip had been sucked out from behind the sun visor and was stuck to the car’s ceiling. The
fragile paper fluttered out of his reach as if it were mocking him. He took his eyes off the
road for a second, but that brief distraction nearly made him crash into the median
separating him from oncoming high-speed traffic across the bridge.
He moved to the right lane and slowed down to 50 mph. With both eyes staring
forward at the road, he leaned to the right and felt the fluttering deposit slip with his
extended fingertips, but too far to grab it. He straightened up in the driver’s seat and
hit the buttons to close the front car windows. He slowed down to 40 mph and steered
onto the shoulder in the middle of the bridge. He brought the car to a gradual stop and
tried to take a deep breath, but it was painful. He turned slowly toward the deposit slip
still attached to the textured ceiling of the car. The fingers of his right hand trembled as
if he was trying to catch a frog before it sprang from his grasp.
A split second before he could lunge, a stiff breeze sucked the deposit slip out
through the sunroof. He gasped and jumped out of the car into oncoming traffic.
* * *
Sharon felt a sudden chill despite the soothing warmth of her scented bath. It
was that same instinctive feeling she’d had as an adolescent when she knew her dad
had died before anyone had given her the bad news. Though intense now, it wasn’t
a feeling that someone had died, but was rather in mortal danger, and with time left
to be saved.
Was Al going to have a heart attack on the golf course? She wondered, then felt
her sardonic sarcasm rise to the moment. Or was Al going to croak in a motel with the
new millennial Assistant Account Manager he’d hired last month riding him like a cowgirl?
But no, she felt for sure, thinking, It’s not Al—it must be Bill. Why can’t I stop thinking
about Bill? I must be losing it.
She pulled the drain latch and the bath water gurgled down the drain. She
watched with hope as the tub emptied, but then she saw what she’d prayed she
wouldn’t see again, blood staining the tub, not bright red, but almost purple.
Her oncologist had warned her this could be a first sign, that it could be the
beginning of what most likely would be the end. She’d kept it from Al because she
felt there was no point in telling him. She didn’t want his sympathy or pity. What
she’d wanted from him at the start, she’d never gotten. She wanted to be cherished
for who she was, nothing more. No lavish life of luxury, just a shared appreciation
of each other. But Al was always too busy with self-appreciation, needing accolades
for his achievements in business, realized by his wealth and social status.
She dressed quickly and dashed out to her car in the driveway. She backed out
into the street and took off with a chirp of the tires, but with no sense of direction, only
of urgency. Something in her subconscious led her back towards the mall. To what end,
she had no idea, but she licked her lips, redolent, if only in her mind, of another woman’s
husband, of a man in danger, like herself, of dying—Bill.
* * *
Bill dodged oncoming traffic on the bridge, but only peripherally, because his focus was
on the bank deposit slip fluttering like a butterfly with each passing vehicle.
“Get off the road, ya idiot!” a truck driver shouted at him.
With man and physics in a split second of perfect harmony, Bill dove at the elusive
slip of paper. With the object of his desire clutched firmly in his grasp, he somersaulted on
the highway and came up to a proud stance of victory. Holding the deposit slip firmly with
both hands to read the name and address on it, he thought he saw a vision of his mystery
woman. In that millisecond, he realized it was not a dream at all. It was “Sharon” as the
name said on the slip. She was behind the wheel of the vehicle that hit him. Even with its
screeching brakes, her car lifted Bill off his feet. He landed on the hood. Semiconscious,
through the windshield, he stared at his mystery woman’s face, dissolving and aghast at
the sight of him.
* * *
In the waiting room outside the same ER as yesterday, Sharon saw Abby coming toward
her. Sharon stood to greet her, but Abby, much taller and physically fit, shoved her back down
into the chair.
“This can’t be a coincidence, bitch!” Abby shouted, drawing the attention of a security
guard as others in the waiting room moved away from the two women.
“Whoa! Bill was in the middle of the highway, jumping up and down as if he had no
idea where he was. An eight-wheeler was in front of me and suddenly swerved to avoid him.
All I could do was hit my brakes to avoid hitting him. Is he OK?”
“He’s conscious, but having a complete MRI,” Abby huffed. “He could have internal
injuries, but fortunately he seems to have no broken bones.
“Please . . . tell him I’m so sorry,” Sharon said. “This time we really should exchange our
insurance information.”
“If Bill has extended injuries we’ll sue your ass,” Abby said.
Sharon shirked. “We have excellent insurance that will cover it . . . but truly, I am sorry.”
“Please, just go away,” Abby huffed.
Heading down the long hospital corridor toward the parking lot, Sharon still sensed
Abby glaring at her, like a chill wind at her back.
* * *
Bill’s choice of music while having an MRI was classic rock, though he didn’t dare nod
his head or tap his foot to the beat of The Stones’ “Get Off of My Cloud.” No one told him
what had happened, but the last thing he recalled was chasing after the bank deposit slip on
the bridge. He thought he had a recollection of his mystery woman’s face, but her expression
had puzzled him. She’d been aghast with her mouth agape, so he thought it was just what he
remembered from slamming head-on into her outside the bank. It had all become a jumble
from which he could make no sense.
He tried not to feel claustrophobic within the MRI tube, but if it weren’t for The Stones,
he’d have thought he was dead inside a casket. Every inch of his body ached to the bone, so he
wondered if he might be better off dead than to endure a lengthy recovery from whatever the
hell had happened. Though he still couldn’t block out the face of his mystery woman, as he
opened his eyes in his hospital room after the MRI, her face morphed into Abby’s, but her voice
sounded as if it came from a deep well.
“What’s with you in that woman?” Abby asked, but he didn’t know what to say.
He felt as if Abby could hear his inner thoughts of betrayal with the nameless woman
he’d tried to find. He closed his eyes to avoid any further questioning. Minutes later, he
squinted to see if Abby had left. With relief, he took a deep breath, but he began to cough
uncontrollably. A nurse came in to give him a snort of oxygen for relief.
“Take these,” the nurse said, handing him two pills. “Let me raise your head,” she said
controlling the bed remotely. “They’ll help stop your coughing.”
She handed him a paper cup of water. He swallowed the pills and sighed with relief.
“Thanks, Sharon,” he said, but the nurse gave him a queer look and tapped her name
tag with her finger to show him that her name was Jenny. “Sorry. I mean, thank you, Jenny.”
“Your wife, Sharon, can see you later,” Jenny said as she left the room.
My wife . . . Sharon? He thought. Where did that come from? Then he remembered
the name he’d seen on the deposit slip and thought, My mystery woman, my Sharon . . . .
* * *
It was Sunday morning and Al hadn’t come home yet from his golfing weekend. Sharon
was certain he was cheating on her. Even their boys seemed to have a sense of it, but like her,
they’d conditioned themselves to ignore their father’s strained absences and the negative
effect on their mother. But rather than unifying with Sharon’s contempt, they had each found
separate ways to deal with their father’s infidelity. Their sons were eighteen and twenty with
romantic interests of their own. They worshipped their father, not just for his success, but
Al was a guys’ guy, speaking a language to his sons that was as foreign to Sharon as Klingon.
Sharon often felt as if she’d been no more to Al than a receptacle to breed clones of himself,
which they may well have done.
She was, in some ways, relieved about the news she’d heard weeks ago from her
gynecologist. She’d had some brief hope that the news would be that at age forty she was
pregnant, hopefully with a daughter with whom she might bond, like the only child Sharon
herself had been. She’d be a kid sister to her two older brothers, but even though Al would
spoil a daughter terribly with lavish gifts and affection, she would be her daughter, her
confident, the sibling she’d never had.
But Sharon wasn’t pregnant, could never be pregnant again, and was dying from a rare
cancer. She had little time, perhaps months, but maybe only weeks left to live. She refused to
waste what little time she had on being pitied by Al or their sons. She’d been a dutiful wife and
mother since she married Al right after college, but the little time remaining would have to be
hers—all hers.
She was barred from the one recent joy she’d found, literally by accident. It was this
sort-of-goofy guy named Bill who’d lived in the same town for twenty years, but she’d never
noticed him before, not until he’d slammed head-on into her at the bank. Then she’d nearly
run him over with her car.
She thought. What the hell’s with that?
* * *
The next time he opened his eyes, Bill saw his ER physician holding his chart and
squinting at him.
“How do you feel, Bill?” the doctor asked.
“Like the operation was a success, but the patient died,” Bill said with a forced grin.
The doctor seemed to grab at that straw of Bill’s good humor by saying, “Well, Bill,
I’m afraid you’re not far off . . . I do have good news . . . and bad news.”
Bill raised his bed and sat up. “Shoot, Doc.”
“Your injuries from being hit by a car are miraculously minor . . . but in order to
detect any internal ruptures or even hairline fractures, we gave you a complete MRI and
we’ve found something far worse . . . a brain tumor . . . it’s inoperable, and there is evidence
that it’s cancer and may have already metastasize throughout your lymph system.”
“How much time do I have?” Bill asked.
“Impossible to pinpoint, Bill. We have some new wonder drugs that might prolong
the inevitable. We can recommend treatment for your symptoms, but with no assurance of
a cure.”
“Have you told, my wife?”
“Not yet, Bill. I just found out myself.”
“Then don’t . . . leave that to me.”
* * *
Sharon lied to her family about her illness. “I just need time alone,” she told Al. “It’s
probably premature menopause, but I can’t stand another day in that house with the boys at
school and you at work.”
“Where would you go?” Al asked, as if the idea of Sharon doing anything on her own
without him was implausible.
“Anywhere. Any place I want to go!”
Al and their two sons watched her throw her luggage into her car. They gave her no
help as if they were watching a film about a crazy woman and would have no part of it. She
didn’t bother to wave as she backed out of the driveway for parts unknown. The boys waved
with blank expressions.
Al just shook his head. “How about pizza, guys? The Knicks are playing Philly at home.”
* * *
Bill didn’t tell Abby about the doctor’s prognosis, so she believed him when he told
her that he’d need eight to ten weeks of physical therapy, but he’d be able to drive to the
therapist for his treatments. He assured Abby she needn’t be dissuaded from her busy
schedule with her flock of adolescent cheerleaders, her yoga sessions, and indoor tennis with
the colder weather coming. He’d taken a sabbatical from school till January. He convinced
Abby that he’d be fine in a few months . . . just fine.
Abby took Bill at his word and resumed her busy schedule. Bill went to his first
consultation with an oncologist. He was reading The New Yorker in the waiting room when
a nurse called his name, “Bill!” Before he looked up from the magazine, he heard another
“Bill!” but it was a different voice. Then he saw her standing in the doorway coming from
the examination rooms. It was his mystery woman staring at him oddly. Her expression was
unexpected, as if she were glad to see him, though in fact, they’d uttered only a few words
to each other before, he on the sidewalk with a broken nose and she with a bump on her
forehead.
“Bill . . . are you OK?” she asked.
“Sharon?” he said with uncertainty, wondering if with all the stress of his prognosis,
she might morph into someone else.
“Yes,” she said. “I’m so sorry. It really was an accident.”
“Bill, the doctor is waiting,” the nurse said.
“I know,” he said to Sharon. “I don’t blame you. It was my fault . . . both times.”
“No one’s fault,” Sharon said.
“I have to go,” he said.
“See you,” she said with sad eyes and a weak wave of her hand.
“Not if I see you first,” he kidded her with a wink, which made her smile. After Bill
waved back as he entered the examination corridor, Sharon went to her car and wept.
Nature seemed to cry with her in a sudden, blinding downpour. She watched for an hour,
hoping to see Bill when he left the medical complex, but it was a huge lot with many
sections. The rain kept her from seeing more than ten feet in front of her windshield.
After two hours, she went to the motel off the freeway where she’d rented a room for
the week after leaving Al and the boys.
She watched TCM’s old black-and-white movies on TV in her motel room and sipped
Chardonnay. As invigorating as seeing Bill for that brief moment had been, the emptiness
of the motel room made her feel even more lonely than with Al and the boys.
It was almost autumn and the leaves would be changing color, but she might be
dead by Thanksgiving. Taking the experimental drug to help others in the future who’d
be dying from her disease would commence tomorrow morning. It was the least she
could do, helping others after knowing her time soon would be up. No reason to be
selfish now, after she’d always put her husband and sons first. She’d enjoy this final
taste of wine before her chemotherapy would begin in the morning. No more wine
after that, maybe no more anything.
* * *
When Bill came out of the oncologist’s examination room and returned to the waiting
room, he hoped Sharon would still be there, but that would be too good to be true. He ached
to see her again, but what was the point? Once he’d begun his treatments, at best, they’d only
prolong his inevitable fate. With his time away from school there was the longshot that he
might at least finish his novel before Christmas when presumably, before the New Year, he’d
be dead.
* * *
“What’s in the briefcase?” Abby asked Bill, dressed in his sweats as if he were going to
physical therapy.
“I agreed to mark some term papers before the end of the year,” he lied. “Don’t want
the work to pile up around the holidays.”
The briefcase contained the first draft of his novel, which he planned to edit while he
still had the physical strength and mental faculties to do so.
He checked in at the oncology center and had his prep by drinking some godawful
solution which, ironically, was meant to deter his nausea, but it gagged him. The stress before
beginning his first chemo treatment stimulated his sinus allergies and he began to wheeze.
“I thought you marked down on your rap sheet that you didn’t have asthma?” the nurse
said.
“I don’t,” he said. “It’s the fall pollen. Nothing helps.”
“Just want you to know that with this chemo, your immune system is at risk and your
breathing will most likely become worse. A side-effect of this drastic treatment has been viral
pneumonia.”
“You call it breathing. My wife calls it wheezing,” Bill said with good humor, making the
nurse crack a smile. “Any other good news?”
“It’s all uphill from here, Bill. Are you ready?”
He nodded, noting seven soft reclining chairs just like his with IV poles next to each.
“Having a slow day?” he asked.
“The next patient starts in an hour,” she said. “We stagger them an hour apart so if
we’re short-staffed for any reason, we still can have everyone done by five o’clock.”
“I wish my high school could be that efficient with its scheduling.”
She smiled. “You’ll feel a burning sensation at first, but if it becomes too intense, just
pull that cord and I’ll come running. How is it so far?”
“Burning,” he said with a grimace. “Doesn’t matter . . . I’m probably going to hell in a
hand basket anyway. Might as well get used to the heat.”
* * *
When Bill came out of his initial doze, there was a curtain drawn around him for privacy.
The curtain opened just as he looked at his watch and saw he’d slept for three hours.
Nurse Lillian smiled and asked, “How’re you feeling?”
“Like I just got hit by a speeding car, but I’m getting used to that feeling.”
He hung his head with his chin to his chest, but lifted it when he heard, “Bill?” He
cocked his head and heard it again, but Lillian’s lips were closed.
“Are you a ventriloquist, Lillian?” he asked.
She jerked her head toward the curtain separating him from another patient. He
waved his hand for her to pull back the curtain and said, “Sharon?”
As the curtain slowly revealed Sharon hooked up to an IV, Bill recalled watching
Spartacus when the Roman guards opened the bars separating Kirk Douglas from Jean
Simmons so the guards could watch them fornicate from the open hatch above their cell.
In his mind a ceremonial horn trumpeted the preamble to their observed fornication. Though
his first reaction to seeing her was immediate arousal, her vulnerability with the IV dripping
poison into her veins made his heart sink.
Doomed, he thought. Together at last, but we’re both doomed.
Seeing Bill glaring at her, she asked him, “Are you feeling what I’m feeling?”
It was a loaded question, because even though she must be referring to the fire
pulsing through her veins from the chemo, his inner perception was about something more
than physical stress. He answered accordingly.
“I’m feeling that I never want to let you out of my sight again,” he said.
Sharon’s mouth dropped open and her eyelashes fluttered. “Wh-why?” she asked.
“If you don’t already know, there’s no point in telling you,” he said, feeling more
courage than he’d ever experienced.
“Do you love me?” she asked, feeling foolish the moment she said it.
“I feel as though I’d loved you before I’d ever seen you.”
“But now that you’ve seen me?”
“You’re someone I’d lost so long ago that, not only had I forgotten when, but also who
we were at the time. This week was the first time I’d ever seen you in this life, except in my
dreams.”
“You mean like reincarnation?”
“Maybe, but I’m not much of a philosopher,” Bill said with a shrug. “How about you?”
“I feel it, but fear it’s just desperation,” she said. “My life sucks . . . and now it’ll be over
very soon. What if it’s just wishful thinking . . . for you, too? Are you happy? You must be--
Abby’s beautiful.”
Bill felt a pang of regret like a hot coal in the pit of his gut. How could he leave Abby?
Men envied him for having Abby, but was that a logical reason to stay with her? Who could
marry such an attractive, smart woman, then leave her for someone else? But it wasn’t just
someone else, it was Sharon, the woman he would love forever in his mind.
“I love her as the mother of my children,” Bill said. “But I have little time left and want
to make every second that remains count, maybe to prepare me for what comes afterwards.”
“You believe in that—the hereafter?” she asked.
“I don’t know what comes afterwards any more than anyone else, but I feel there’s got
to be more than just this. Something much greater.”
“I feel the same way, Bill. Are you going home from here?”
“Not if I can be with you.”
“What will you tell Abby? Please, anything except that you’re on an overnight golf
outing?”
“I don’t play golf, too much pollen on the courses.”
“I’ve left my family,” she said. “They have no idea that I’m ill and dying. I have a room
at the Hampton Inn off I-95 five miles from here.”
“I’ll wait for you to finish your treatment and follow you there.”
Lillian came back to detach Bill’s IV from his port. “Is your driver here to take you
home?” Lillian asked Bill.
“I used Dial-a-Ride,” he lied. “I’ll buzz them from the lobby with my phone.” Then he
turned to Sharon. “We have to stop meeting like this.”
Nurse Lillian raised her eyebrows then shook her head, knowing from thirty years in the
cancer ward that The Big C often made strange bedfellows.
Jack waited for an hour in the lobby then he saw Sharon coming off the elevator. A
nurse was pushing her in a wheelchair. Jack got to his feet, and though he still felt a little dizzy
from the chemo, he recalled how he’d once faked sobriety at a DUI stop coming home from
a Little League victory celebration with his son. It had to start with the breathing, controlling
the oxygen intake to maintain balance in your stride. But he sensed that his words might still
become garbled and was relieved when Sharon spoke up in his behalf.
“There’s my husband,” she told the nurse, fortunately not Lillian. “Hi, Darling. Did you
pull your car up to the curb?”
Bill just nodded with Cheshire grin. It was pouring rain and almost dark. He gave his
hand to Sharon outside the entrance. They hooked elbows.
“My car’s just ahead,” he told the nurse, having told more lies in one day than he had
in a lifetime. He led her to his car and opened the door for her. Sitting side-by-side, they each
remained silent as he drove through the parking lot. Bill reached over and took Sharon’s hand
in his, both cold to each other’s touch. Bill’s car interior was heady with each of them inhaling
each other’s scent counterpointed by Bill’s rhythmic wheezing.
“I’ve made my peace about my sons,” Sharon said. “They won’t miss me. They’ll get
over my absence in a hurry. Al, too. Won’t your children need you? Of course they will.”
“That’s true,” Bill said with a shrug. “And I’ll miss them very much. Abby, too. But I’ll
be dead soon and they’ll have to move on anyway.”
“Maybe we don’t deserve this,” Sharon said.
“Are you afraid what we’re doing will send us to hell?”
“I feel like I’ve already been there.”
“It hasn’t been hell with Abby,” he said. “She’s been a good wife and mother, but . . .”
“But what?”
“She just isn’t you,” he said, squeezing her hand.
* * *
They pulled into the lot at the Hampton Inn. She led the way to her room.
“You first,” he said nodding to the bathroom. “I’ll shower after you.”
Though his gesture was gallant, he had to burst into the bathroom and kneel in front of
the toilet and puke his guts out. She got out of the shower without bothering to cover herself
with a towel and rubbed his neck and back to comfort him as he choked and vomited and
wheezed. No sooner had he finished retching than they switched places and it was her turn to
puke and groan.
The sheets were cold against their naked bodies in the king-size bed, and for the first
half hour they both shivered uncontrollably. But after an hour, with Sharon’s head tucked in
the crook of Bill’s neck, their bodies seemed to morph into one with a single heartbeat.
It was 2 a.m. when Bill sensed that Sharon was awake, too.
“Teri Garr,” he said.
“What?”
“Abby is like Teri Garr in the movies,” he said. “Remember her in The Black Stallion?
She wasn’t a bad mom, but she kept nagging the poor kid about the damn horse. She was
always disapproving.”
“Oh, yeah,” Sharon said. “I remember.”
“For decades I’ve felt like Richard Dreyfus in Close Encounters . . .”
“You mean you’re going to make a mountain out of our breakfast in the morning?”
“No, but Abby is like Teri Garr in that movie, too,” Bill said. “She just didn’t understand
her husband. Worse yet, she didn’t want to understand him or his inner needs. Tonight, being
here with you, makes me feel like Dreyfus, ready to leave everything behind to walk that ramp
into a flying saucer and seek new adventures with a new life in another world—with you.”
“Do you think of me as an alien?” she asked, but he could see in the dim light that she
was smiling with sparkling white teeth.
“I think of you as everything that’s been missing from my life, Sharon.”
She hugged him tighter beneath the sheets now warm from their naked bodies.
“But I’m just like Teri Garr, too,” she said.
“How so?”
“How ’bout a r-r-roll in da hay?”
“Young Frankenstein?”
“That’s Frankenshteen.”
He pulled her close as their noses touched and he ran his hands across her body. Then
he whispered, “Vot knockers.”
“No, I’m Frau Blücher.”
Bill whinnied like a horse and they both laughed so hard they had to catch their breath.
“Who wouldn’t believe John Denver can talk to God?” she asked.
“He does now,” Bill said. “So does George Burns.
“That’s dark.”
“Too dark?
“No, Bill . . . I like your darkness.”
“Show me how much.”
Each wondered how they could have been so close for so many years in their little town
yet never have met till this week. They exchanged deep searches into the other’s eyes realizing
they could never go back. They made love till sunrise with whatever strength still remained in
their minds and limbs as if it would be their last time.
* * *
Sharon’s chemo was scheduled to begin shortly before Bill’s and the third patient
wasn’t due for another hour. He asked Nurse Lillian if he could be seated beside Sharon so
they could talk during their treatments.
“Just remember that you’ll both need to rest,” Lillian said. “I don’t want you to disturb
any of the other patients with your jabbering. Keep your laughter and wheezing down to a dull
roar. After I hook you up, Bill, how about if I pull the curtains around you both to cut back on
the sound of your voices?”
Bill kidded, “I’ll have what she’s having.”
Lillian smirked. “The hell you will. You have very different cancers. What’s good for the
goose here,” she nodded to Sharon, “will not be good for the gander. And vice versa.”
Bill gave Sharon a knowing glance and she faintly grinned with understanding as Lillian
began Bill’s IV drip. He watched Lillian make the connections and insert the IV into his port
below his collarbone still bruised purple from the surgical insertion days before, as was
Sharon’s as well. All was going to their plan.
“I hope you two lovebirds have a nice trip,” Lillian said with a wink as she drew the
curtains around them.
Bill and Sharon gave each other knowing looks. He stood from his chair and squeezed
both of their IV tubes to stop the flow. He handed Sharon his tube to squeeze tightly and he
continued to do the same for hers. He did just what Nurse Lillian had warned against. He
switched their IVs. The effect of their decision took less time than either had imagined.
Holding hands, they leaned towards each other and kissed with mutual tastes of satisfaction.
In their minds, First Class flight attendant, Lillian, had brought them cocktails to begin
their journey. Not just a vacation, their shared trip had been their lifelong dream, so they
intended to make it special in every way, from their soft reclining chairs to every subtle detail,
as if this trek would be their final journey together.
From their smiling faces observed with shock by Nurse Lillian an hour later when she
found them, both Bill and Sharon were content to know it was their last shared experience,
but only in this material world. Both anticipated landing in another together and forever . . .
The Black Spot
by
Gerald Arthur Winter
Camp NO-BE-BO-SCO in the 1950s was the Blairstown, New Jersey
campsite for Boy Scout troops of North Bergen County. Bobby was a tenderfoot
scout in the Rattlesnake Patrol of Troop 52 in the Borough of Oakland on his first
autumn campout. In retrospect, it was surely colder than it is now in mountainous
northwest Jersey with Sand Pond already frozen on a late October weekend at
the base of the Kittatinny Ridge.
At age eleven, Bobby had already been through the summer hazing by
older scouts age twelve to fourteen. He knew that being sent to a neighboring
troop at a campsite for a smoke sifter or a left-handed axe was a trick the older
boys played on a tenderfoot scout to make him a fool to laugh at and mock.
On his summer campout he had learned to dig a latrine, pitch a tent, and
make a fire. But in the cold weather, a dozen Boy Scouts, three Explorer
Scouts in high school wearing their dark green uniforms, and Scout Master,
Mr. Katell would sleep in a log cabin with ten bunkbeds.
In the summer he’d encountered insects, spiders, amphibians, and
reptiles, including a six-foot black racer he saw swallow a squirrel. Now the
ground was already frozen and as hard as macadam at the end of October
with just deer, coyotes, foxes, opossums raccoons, skunks, bobcats, and
bears with which to contend. Sheltered by the warmth of the cabin with
a wood stove to cook their meals, the only time the scouts had to face
the elements and wild animals was on their short jaunts to the outhouse.
Or so the five tenderfoot scouts had been lead to believe.
The Cable Trail was always the first challenge to a tenderfoot at “NO-BE”
as scouts affectionately called the year-round campsite. The three-day weekend
included a Saturday hike up The Cable Trail, so named because a thick metal
cable had been implanted from the base of the ridge to the Appalachian Trail
high above. The cable had been installed in the 1930s so hikers could climb the
huge boulders of the escarpment by holding onto the cable to avoid a disastrous
plunge that could cause severe injuries or death. A fall from top to bottom was
what the older scouts called “ a three screamer” because of how many times
you had to scream before you would hit bottom.
The five tenderfoot scouts with no merit badges or sashes to display
them were the most talkative on the trail, unaware that two of the Explorers
as their only supervision on the adventure, were there to verify the tenderfoot
scouts’ fulfillment for their Hiking merit badges. This included a 10-mile roundtrip
trek among the autumn elements on The Appalachian Trail. The new scouts’
parents had not been told that this exposure to the wild was included in the
weekend’s activities because it was meant to toughen up their preteen sons.
“No mama’s boys allowed in this troop,” the two explorers said as
they departed on their hike up The Cable Trail.
The older scouts, one Explorer, and the Scout Master stayed behind
in the cabin because the older scouts had already had the 10-mile hike
initiation on previous autumn campouts. The older scouts would be passing
their Firs Aid and Cooking merit badges this trip. Though the five younger
tenderfoot scouts were told they would be back at the cabin to join the
others for dinner, in the hiking party of seven, each carried provisions for
an overnight stay in the forest.
“Why do we have to carry these heavy knapsacks?” one tenderfoot
complained. “It’s hard enough holding onto this cold metal cable without
gloves.
Another argued, “If we’re not gonna use these mess kits, shovels,
and axes, why carry them?”
“Stop complaining and pay attention to your footing, scout!”
Explorer Randy shouted to the others below him as he led the way over
the boulders. “Dave and I are carrying pup tent plus our other supplies.”
“What for?” another young scout shouted. “We’ll be back tonight
for dinner and sleep in the warm cabin! We don’t need our sleeping bags!”
Explorer Dave shouted from where he took up the rear, “What’s
the Boy Scout motto?”
Bobby shouted, “Be prepared!”
The other four tenderfoot scouts glared at him as if he’d farted
in a movie theater.
“Lemme hear a ‘That’s right!’ ” Explorer Dave shouted from the rear.
“That’s right!” Bobby shouted, but his solo response died in the cold
wind with glares from the other four tenderfoot scouts.
Randy shouted, “The Black Spot’s gonna sense your lack of enthusiasm
and keep us from getting back to the cabin tonight!”
“The what?” Billy, the chubby, least athletic of the tenderfoot scouts asked.
“How could you guys come to NO-BE without being prepared to deal with
The Black Spot?”
“What the heck is that?” Jimmy, another tenderfoot shouted.
“Dave!” Randy shouted. “I can’t believe how lame these tenderfeet are.”
“Piss poor!” Dave agreed.
Bobby figured these two Explorers were pulling the same crap on the
younger kids that he’d experienced last summer, thinking . . . Left handed axe,
jeez. Here we go again.
They reached the top of the ridge and counted heads.
“O.K. scouts!” Randy said. “We’re all accounted for, so now we’re gonna
hike four miles north along the Appalachian Trail. We’ll stop at the base of the
radio tower at the peak of the ridge and cook lunch. It’s a good chance for Dave
and me to qualify you all for your Camping merit badges. I’m a Life Scout and
Dave is a Star Scout. We both plan to qualify for Eagle Scout next year, so you’d
best listen to all we teach you.
When they reached the radio tower they made camp with a clearing
and used large stones to make a safe fire pit. The five younger scouts gathered
kindling and the two Explorers chopped firewood from fallen trees. Once the
fire was glowing coals they cooked hotdogs on sticks and the Explorers doled
out a large spoonful of baked beans from a pot they’d used to heat them.
The younger boys were busy cutting up and seeing who could fart the loudest
and longest after the bean fest complete with canned sauerkraut to step up
the game with their cajoling.
“Hey! It’s getting dark already with the time change.” Bobby asked,
“When are we heading back to the cabin?”
“Yeah, Randy. I’m getting’ cold with the sun going down,” Johnny, the
runt in the troop complained.
“Listen up, scouts,” Randy said. “We’re up here on a mission. Scout
Master Katell gave me strict orders to bring back you five scouts qualified
for your Hiking and Camping merit badges. Nothing short of that will do
because, as your leader, I’ll closer to becoming an Eagle Scout.
“You mean were not going back to the cabin?” Billy said with a shiver,
his jowls shaking.
“Got that right, scout,” Explorer Randy said. So while Dave stays back
here to tend the fire for safety, I’m taking you to learn about the legend of
The Black Spot.”
“Everyone up!” Dave said. “Single file with Randy in the lead and
Bobby taking up the rear. It’ll be dark when you get back here to camp,
so just take your flashlights.
“This is gonna suck,” Evan, the wise guy in the group of first-timers,
grumbled.
“Actually, it’ll be really cool,” Dave said with his voice fading away
behind them as he remained at the campsite.
The line of five scouts were led by one Explorer headed west off the
ridge toward another peak that jutted from the western horizon with the sun
setting behind it and the sky turning crimson . . . orange . . . then mauve.
“How far are we going?” Bobby asked from the rear.
“Less than a mile, but the terrain is rough,” Randy said. “Flashlights on!
Getting dark fast. Good thing it’s cold. In the summer we’d have to worry
about timber rattlers and copperheads. I’ve seen a few up here last summer.
Big suckers. Four feet long and thick as a fire hose in the middle.”
“What’s this Black Spot BS anyway?” Evan asked.
“You’ll see,” Randy said. “Let’s step up the pace.
Panting at nearly a jog, the boys in single file followed Randy. No
one could see more than the heels of the scout ahead of him within his
flashlight beam. Only Randy could warn the others what was coming ahead.
“Deep ditch! Sharp stump! Bramble bush!” Then, “Just ahead is the
wreck.”
“Wreck? What wreck?” Bobby asked, sorry to be last in line.
“Hey! Wow!” one scout shouted.
“Yo neat!” said another.
They gathered around Randy and flashed their lights at what
remained of a plane wreck.
“Jeez. This is cool,” Bobby added, last to see the crimped fuselage
of a Cessna 172 Skyhawk hanging with its wings broken from several oak
trees.
“Go ahead, scouts,” Randy gave the five boys the nod. “Check it
out before it’s too dark to see anything. You can climb right up in there,
pretend you’re pilots like the poor guy who crashed the plane.
The boys took turns in the cockpit with its two front seats. They
toyed with the instruments, but the gauges were rusted and the glass
was shattered.
“Gee, Randy, how’d it happen?” Bobby asked.
“I guy was flying his wife and teenage son from the Lincoln Park
Airport to Philly. Happened in ’55 almost four years ago.”
“Were they saved?” chubby Billy asked.
“Saved? Whaddaya kiddin’, fatso!” wise guy Evan scoffed.
“Look at how the wings are broken and the instrument panel is all
fucked up!”
“Yo! Scout!” Randy stood between them with his hands on his
hips. “Watch your mouth.”
“Come on. Ain’t no girls or grownups around,” Evan shrugged.
“It’s not that,” Randy cautioned, looking past the boys circled
around him. “This is solemn ground.”
“Ya mean like Indian burial grounds?” Jimmy asked.
“Even more serious than that,” Randy said. “Evan’s right--
no survivors, or so the papers said.”
“Whaddaya mean?” Bobby asked.
Randy took a deep breath then exhaled slowly.
“The mom and dad died on impact and their remains were
retrieved by the local Fire Rescue Squad. See how the fuselage is all
charred. Almost started a forest fire, but helicopters put it out before
the plane blew up or the fire spread. It was a miracle that it didn’t.”
“You said there was a teenage son,” Bobby said, intent on
Randy’s every word. “What happened to him?
“That’s why we need to be very respectful here.”
“Why?”
“The boy was never found.”
“Never?
“Never.”
“He must’ve burned up in the fire.”
“No remains were found, no bones, no teeth, no clothes,
no nothing.”
“Holy shit!” Evan blurted.
“Hey! I’m not gonna tell ya again,” Randy said. “A little
respect, huh?”
“You mean the cops didn’t have an investigation?” Bobby
asked, always the skeptic. “They had to find something.”
“Nothing at the crash scene,” Randy said.
“Then wh-where?” Billy asked with a blubbering breathless
squeal.
“The first sighting was at a farm a mile west from here,” Randy
pointed.
“Sighting? What kind of sighting,” Evan asked.
“Not really a sighting because all of the accounts have varied,
and all were at night.
“Was he dead?” Billy asked.
“Yes and no,” Randy said. “It was sort of a human form, but
not exactly.”
“What was it? Some kind of zombie?” Evan asked with a chortle.
“Nah. Zombies are made-up shit,” Randy said. “You see the boy
must’ve been burnt really bad from the fire and his body was all broken
from the crash, so the only thing left of him was this mass of amorphous
burnt flesh. That’s why the locals around here call him The Black Spot.”
“What’s a morphous?” Billy asked, his voice quivering.
“Amorphous, dummy,” Bobby cut in. “Shapeless. You know like
an amoeba in science class.”
“Jeez! That’s freakin’ crazy.” Evan said. “I don’t believe that crap.”
“That’s what I’ve been trying to warn you guys about,” Randy said.
“It’s become a local legend these past few years that the kid who died is a
lost soul unable to join his parents. He shows up every full moon wreaking
havoc on the local farmers, even on their livestock.”
“Havoc? Like what?” Bobby asked.
“Sheep, cows, even a horse killed and gutted.”
“Your shittin’ us,” Evan laughed. “Sounds more like a bear or a cougar.”
“Yeah,” Bobby agreed. “What made anyone think it was The Black Spot?”
“No bear tracks or wolf tracks, only human tracks—barefoot, too, cause
the boy’s shoes were blown off in the crash or melted by the fire. Each animal
that was killed was gutted for food and half eaten. That was until last year when
a couple of kids had the same thing done to them when they were playing in
the their yard during a full moon and didn’t come in for dinner. Their parents
found them half eaten in these woods the next morning. ”
“Why would they think it was The Black Spot?” Bobby challenged.
“Because of what he left behind that the cops found.”
“What—fingerprints?” Bobby asked.
“A black gelatin-like substance, burnt flesh from the plane crash.”
“Jeez!” all five boys chorused.
“They’ve found that black guck at every death scene after a full moon
and also at the crash site here where he comes at night during a full moon to
search for his parents. Let’s see if he’s already been here tonight.”
“No way!” Billy shivered.
“Come on, scouts,” Randy pushed them towards the plane. “Be brave.
If The Black Spot knows you’re scared, he’ll shriek and grab you.”
“I ain’t going back in that plane,” Evan said.
“O.K. chicken-shits. I’ll go first,” Randy said then fumbled around in the
backseat for a minute before shouting, “Oh my God!” He turned to the boys
and beamed his flashlight at the palm of the other hand dripping with black
gelatinous guck.
The younger boys were dumbfounded till a loud shriek came from the
woods and echoed across the ridge.
“It’s The Black Spot!” Randy shouted. “Run like hell back to camp before
he grabs ya!”
Bobby stood frozen in his tracks as the others fled. Doubtful, he
turned back towards the lamenting howl coming towards him from the
woods. Then, silhouetted again the bluish-white full moon, a hunched
black glob moved across the horizon like a tumbleweed rolling in the
wind across the plains. Bobby gasped, which turned the figure in his
direction coming closer and closer as it shrieked and howled. Entranced,
Bobby couldn’t move.
The black figure came within ten feet from Bobby. He could
smell something like burnt wood . . . charcoal . . . maybe burnt flesh.
There was no face just the amorphous glob Randy had described,
which let out a shriek with a billow of smoke from its hood-like head
then thrust both arms at him.
Bobby felt his face getting splashed and, with a hand to his
cheek, felt a gelatinous gook dripping down his face. He screamed
and ran but, even though he heard the shrieking fading at a distance
far behind him, when he stumbled to the ground, a hand gripped his
ankle. Scrambling to his feet, Bobby lost a sneaker, but that allowed
him to get away. Hobbling with one stocking foot, he escaped The
Black Spot, but the shrieks and howls ceased as he found the campsite
where the four other younger boys and Randy were shivering around
a campfire kept burning by Dave until they returned.
“Thought we lost you, scout,” Randy said, standing and waving
for Bobby to join the others.
“He almost got me,” Bobby said. “I lost a sneaker getting away.”
“What’s that crap all over your face?” Evan asked.
The others chorused, “Yeah, jeez, look at that.”
“I don’t know,” Bobby said. “The Black Spot flung it at me.”
“Hold still, scout,” Randy said. “It’s that stuff I told you about. The
black guck left behind after a kill. You’re lucky The Black Spot didn’t gut
and eat you.”
Randy wiped the guck off Bobby’s face with a paper towel then
brought the towel to the fire to show the others.
“Jeez! Wow!” the others said.
“Get that crap away from me!” Evan said.
Randy tossed the towel into the fire and it flared. “Good thing Dave
kept our fire going while we were at the plane wreck. We’ll have to take
turns keeping it going through the night to keep The Back Spot away. He
hates fire.”
Their tents were pitched facing the fire pit. Although they took
turns tending the campfire, they all were sleepless through the night
with one eye open in case The Black Spot returned.
* * *
It was a crisp autumn morning when they closed down camp,
making sure the fire was out and nothing was left behind other than
memories of a frightful night. The boys cut up on the way down The
Cable Trail and back to the cabin to join the older scouts for breakfast.
The sausage and pancakes were a treat after a cold night in the woods.
The five tenderfoot scouts had qualified for their Hiking and
Camping merit badges, which they’d all receive at next month’s
ceremony with a sash for their moms to sew them on. Those
not riding home in the Scout Master’s car were picked up by their
parents. Bobby tossed his knapsack and sleeping bag into the trunk
of his dad’s 1956 Chevy Belair. Explorers Randy and Dave came up
to Bobby before he got in the car.
“You were the bravest scout on the overnight campout, Bobby.”
“Nah. I was just as scared as the others.”
“But you didn’t flinch facing danger on your own.”
“I ran too.”
“But you were the last to run.”
Another scout came up to Bobby and the Explorers. His name was
Eric and he was twelve, a year ahead of Bobby in school.
“Hey, Bobby,” Eric said. “Got something for you.” He reached into
his knapsack and handed him a black Keds sneaker, the one he’d lost in
the woods.
Bobby was dumbfounded, but glad his mom wouldn’t give him hell
for losing a sneaker.
“You’ve earned the right to be The Black Spot next year.” He reached
into his knapsack again and showed Bobby two fingers dripping with black
guck. He put the two fingers in his mouth with a slurp and said. “Blackberry
jam.”Though the modern legend of The Black Spot may just have been a prank
played on tenderfoot scouts, that eerie night in the woods evoked nightmares that
could stay with a boy his entire life.
What Goes Around, Comes Around
by Charles E.J. Moulton
Dear Mr. President,
Here is a copy of the mail Chao Guangxi sent to Mrs. Li.
Maybe it can shed some light upon how we deal with this newer situation.
Official regards,
B.H.
Yang-Tze Environmental Clinic Research Centre
March 11th, 2019
Dear Mrs. Li,
How serious the situation actually was must’ve become obvious to Xiang only at the very end. Why he reacted the way he did is hard to say. He had been guiltier of more brutality than his colleagues. By now, the Pacific Ocean overflowed with dead sharks, dying slowly because he had cut off their fins for profit. After all, the wealthy Chinese landowners needed their shark fin soup to get the potency of the bridegrooms to soar sky high.
There was no sight of anything unusual at all at first. Neither Xiang nor the colleagues had thought it might be wrong until they saw the wounded and dying man floating up toward the ship, mutilated just like one of his sharks.
At first, the UFO was nowhere in sight. What caught Xiang’s attention was only the body itself. It lacked arms, floating like debree on a lonesome wave. I think he realized he knew the man, a short and rough sea captain north of Shanghai. Strange thing, though. Xiang mumbled in my presence that he had met him a week before at the airport on his way to Singapore. He could impossibly be floating without arms somewhere in the Pacific Ocean. And yet, here he was, thrown away like garbage - just like a shark.
An unbearable silence hit the deck, the crewmen all dropping their knives with loud metallic clangs, the sharks slipping back into the ocean and disappearing happily into the deep.
From where we stood, Xiang and I both heard the mumblings and cries of the colleagues as they helped the armless man up upon the boat, shaking him, trying to find out how he could be found alive floating in the Pacific without arms.
When the spaceship landed on the water – I shall repeat that: on the water – the silence on the deck turned into a painful gasping awe. We all felt the atmosphere change from shock to terror, I think. Illegal types, trained fishermen, mafia mediators, unemployed guys, all of them now trained animal killers, all of them afraid and desperate, fearing they would be punished, not by the law. By alien visitors.
I grabbed Xiang by his shirt, pulling him away, almost ripping the cloth in the process, telling him we should run to safety on the lower deck. He pushed me away, calling me a coward, insisting on facing the situation. Immediately after that, he ran over to the other sailors and started screaming at them that they were criminals and bloody murderers. “Give up, you morons,” he yelled. “Admit everything.”
The aliens would’ve found him regardless of where he went.
Instinctively, he knew that.
This time, there was no escape to speak of.
It might’ve been getting caught, as it were, punished by having one of his own kind mutilated like an animal by creatures higher than him, that transformed him. It was something he couldn’t escape. So far, he had always escaped the law. I know how much you suffered through the years through his behavior, Mrs. Li.
When the spaceship doors opened, I pulled Xiang back, embraced him, pleaded for us to hide, wait it out, admit everything, change, whatever, for us to move with me back to Beijing and open a bookshop like we had originally planned. Xiang didn’t listen. He clutched that knife so hard, pointing it at his own stomach.
The spaceship started vomiting out all these dead sharks without fins. It really looked like vomit, Mrs. Li. All of these dead sharks appearing out of nowhere, falling out of that thing. No one knew how so many sharks could fit into such a small UFO. In fact, there were so many that I feared that we would never be able to leave the region at all. The waves alone threatened to capsize us.
Xiang started screaming that judgment day had arrived and when I tried to hold him back, he just shouted at me to fuck off, that he should have listened to you. For the first time in his life, he realized that his actions had had serious and lasting side-effects.
It’s hard for me to tell you this, Miss Li, but your son’s last words were to tell you that he tried to be a good person after all, just like you wanted him to be. He regretted killing so many sharks, so he killed himself, shoving his bowie-knife into his own belly.
The aliens, big amphibian beasts with oversized foreheads and big fish-like eyes, told us to stop our shark- and whale-hunting or more people would suffer.
Of course we stopped. We have told other hunters to give it up, as well, but they won’t listen. The Chinese mafia won’t, either.
Please forward my greetings to our friend, the sea captain. Maybe he can help us convince other poachers to stop. The aliens mean business, I think. Is the captain still in hospital? If he reveals the secrets of what really happened to him that day, please tell me about it. I believe you told me he has refused to speak, only uttering one word again and again: “Payback!”
We will see each other at the cemetery tomorrow to lay flowers on your son’s grave. I look foward to speaking with you about my developments. I have no contact with my former criminal companions. The police have insured my safety under the “Witness Protection Programme”. It seems my former criminal companions are not a threat, not anymore.
I have been interrogated numerously by the law at the Yang-Tze Environmental Clinic Research Centre. They will not tell me why they brought me here and not to a prison and are very tight lipped about what they call “the alien problem”. I have heard the words “our aquatic origin” being mentioned.
Obviously, the earthly-alien negotiations aren’t going that well.
They’re punishing the whale poachers now. I have heard stories of floating sea captains without eyes.
To the aliens, it does not seem to matter if you were or are a poacher. Former criminals have been punished just as severely as active whale- and shark-killers. I have not asked my interrogators, but from what I understand the aliens returned after a long absence and were shocked to find what they found.
I will be arriving at the cemetary tomorrow with three bodyguards. Please have the package ready. I will foreward it to the chief interrogator, who seems to be the one who communicates with the aliens from time to time. We need to show the aliens a poacher with a big heart, his childhood love for the sea, his early stories about marine life and his diaries about being lured into becoming a poacher.
Maybe we can convince the visitors there’s hope for humanity after all. I will sign off for tonight. Until tomorrow, Mrs. Li.
Chao Guangxi
Former Poacher
chaoguangxi@redflag.org
Administrator’s note:
Mr. Chao Guangxi was responsible for a serious negotiation with the alien visitors the following week, on March 19th, 2019, which caused the aliens to stop their murderings of humans.
These first alien visitors have not been seen again, for a while at least, although other sightings over slaughter factories worry the population anew. Two slaughter factory CEOs were found hanging on spikes in their fridges yesterday. Are these new deeds committed by the same creatures or new ones?
156 billion animals are slaughtered yearly on our planet for mass consumption.
The aliens seem to be serious about protecting the animals.
How do we react?
.
Boqin Hui
Speaker of the Houses of Parliament
Beijing, China
When the Carnival Left Town
by
GERALD ARTHUR WINTER
Christmas had passed quickly for Tim at age thirteen. There had been no long list of toys
or board games for his parents to buy. He hadn’t believed in Santa Claus since age seven. This
was his last year before high school and he hoped to make the best of it before he’d have to
relinquish his top dog position in eighth grade to become a lowly high school freshman.
All the good looking girls from his class would be dating upperclassmen next September.
The older boys drove hotrods and had summer jobs that made enough to take a girl to the
drive-in theater to make out. The best Tim had to offer a girl was a half-mile ride on his
handlebars coasting at 50 mph down Long Hill Road. With her hair blowing in his face, she
smelled like Dentine gum, the precursor to a wet kiss at the bottom of the steep hill. A lime
Ricky in a tall, frosted glass would quench their thirst for something more than each other on
that long trek back up the hill to repeat the downhill thrill.
Tim was walking down that same hill on New Year’s Eve 1957 to bring his dad a six-pack
of Rheingold. Tim had tried a swig from his dad’s beer can once, but it tasted bitter. His dad
preferred Schmidt’s, but then Tim wouldn’t get to check out all the Miss Rheingold contestants.
In the 50s Miss Rheingold was a cross between Miss American and Playmate of the Year. No
nudity, but it was that “girl next door” draw to a horny teenager casting his ballot in a liquor
store.
He’d have to sneak the Sears catalogue into the attic to look at the panty ads by
flashlight, but he could just gloat at Miss Rheingold in the light of day using his prurient
imagination. Who’d know?
Tim’s mission that night took him to Hunklees’ delicatessen to buy a six-pack for
his dad. No proof of age was required. In a small rural town, if you told Mr. Hunklee your
dad sent you to buy him beer, but it was for actually for yourself, there was nothing local
authorities could do to you compared to the damage at home when your dad kicked your
ass. Back then, there was no such concept of “grounding” a teenage miscreant for crossing
a boundary. Up close and personal, corporal punishment ruled the day.
After Tim’s graduation from grammar school, the older high school boys were too
impatient to wait till September. The fresh flock of freshman girls scantily clad in bathing
suits were baking in the summer sun. The nubile teens smelled like fresh muffins out of the
oven buttered with Coppertone on their colorful beach towels at Crystal Lake. Upperclassmen
were ready to line up their dates for the Sock Hop with three months of summer foreplay. If
there was any air of frigidity in that equation, it could be broken by the time the first bell rang
to start the school year at Ramapo High.
Tim was doing his best to maintain his hold on Donna, his on-again-off-again girlfriend
since third grade, but like her girlfriends, the beep of a hot rod’s horn at the entrance gate to
the lake was like a duck call from a hunting blind. The girls left the boys from their graduating
class behind to ride home alone on their English racer bikes. This travesty to a fourteen-year-old
boy’s ego was devastating. Tim felt like Clark Kent competing with super-heroes flying above
and swooping down to steal all he’d accomplished with Donna, which was somewhere between
second and third base. He’d been short-stopped more often than he cared to count.
The last week in August always brought a wind shift when the carnival came to town.
Usually a black-topped parking lot overflow for the local church, the annual carnival took
up every inch of that reserved space. The local paper always warned with flyer announcements
stuffed in mailboxes: The Carnival comes to town next week.
Be sure to lock your homes and cars.
Don’t let your children go out alone
at night. Be wary of pickpockets.
Your local Police Dept.
Within walking distance, for old time’s sake, Donna agreed to go with Tim to the
carnival the first night it opened. He’d won some prizes for Donna at the games of chance
from the Wheel of Fortune to Whack-a-Toad. Among Tim’s bounty were a pair of lovebirds
in a cage, which he’d hoped would serve as a symbol of his long-time affection for Donna
from age eight to fourteen. She found it more of a nuisance having to ask the carnies
operating the rides to keep an eye on the love birds when she and Tim went on the Ferris
wheel, Scrambler, Tilt-a-whirl, or their favorite, The Octopus.
They’d had their share of cotton candy, popcorn, and falafel and had made the
rounds of all the rides three times as it neared 10 p.m., Donna’s curfew, and for anyone
under eighteen in the little borough of Oakdale.
“How about same time tomorrow night, Donna?” Tim asked at her front porch.
“Sorry, Tim . . . I’m busy tomorrow night.”
“Oh . . . how about the next night?
“Busy then, too.”
“Oh . . . any other night free to go with me to the carnival?”
“No, Tim. I’m going to be busy from now on.”
“How do you mean?”
“When you took that last ride on The Octopus alone, Danny Clifford, you know, the
quarterback on the Ramapo football team, he asked me to go to the Sock Hop first Saturday
night after the game with Fair Lawn. He asked me to be his steady girl . . . so I can’t see you
again after tonight. I promised Danny.”
Echoing in my head from dawn to dusk was—I promised Danny.
The only way I could get those words out of my mind was to spend all my time at the
carnival. I’d thought about becoming a carnie and running away as a high school dropout. I’d
gotten to know the operator of The Octopus after fifty rides that week. Sometimes I didn’t
even get off. I just nodded to “Red,” as he was called, and made a spinning motion with my
index finger.
Red nodded and took my quarter for my next spin. But if there was a group of girls
waiting their turn to ride The Octopus, Red would grab one by the wrist and put her in
the cab with me.
“Have fun with this one, Timmy-boy,” he’d say aside to me with a wink as he snapped
down the safety bar to keep us from falling out on the high swooping spins of the cab. Me and
the girl he’d put in the cab with me were locked in close with our faces pressed against each
other’s, especially on the spins.
Red had a freckled face, red hair like Howdy Dowdy, and on his neck, beneath a green-
and-yellow-checkered kerchief, I’d seen a tattoo of a five-pointed star the size of a quarter.
He had light-blue eyes that seemed to shimmer under the bright carnival lights at night. He
had a creepy grin like a Leprechaun with a pot of gold hidden where no one else could find it.
After so many rides on The Octopus with lots of different girls supplied by Red, I
noticed how he touched the girls very subtly, but intentionally as they got into and out of the
cab. After the first few times he gave me a nod as if to tell me—Hey, I’ve set you up, Timmy-
boy. Go ahead. She’s all yours.
Then on the last night of the carnival in the line waiting to get on The Octopus below,
I saw from the cab I was staying on that a group of older boys with their dates were next in
the queue to board. It was almost 9:45 p.m. so this was the last spin before curfew, my last
chance to soar before school started. To my amazement, Red grabbed the last girl in line and
left her date standing there dumbfounded.
“Hey! Whaddaya think yer doin’?” the older boy complained.
“Stuff it, kid!” Red said to him. “Stand back! Safety rules!” He pushed the boy, making
him fall to the ground. He lifted the boy’s date into the cab and slammed down the safety bar.
With that motion, Red’s knuckles brushed against the girl’s breasts. He grinned and winked at
me, then said, “Cream of the crop and she’s all yours, Timmy-boy.” It was Donna.
On the first swoop upward then on the downward spin, Donna’s face pressed against
mine. We turned to face each other, first with a peck of tight lips, then like candle wax melting
from the heat of a flame our lips oozed together with mutual pleasure. Though it cost me a
black eye from the varsity quarterback, I wore it proudly for many weeks until just a hint of
purple shown at the corner of my eye when it was too cold to ride my bike down Long Hill
Road with Donna on my handlebars.
Soon it would be winter and Long Hill Road would ice over after the first big
snowstorm. Then Donna and I would go sledding, she on my back or seated in my lap
as I steered my Flexible Flyer downhill. Just like on my bike, the sled would reach 50
mph and sometimes we’d end up in a soft pile of deep snow at the bottom of the hill.
Our noses, frozen red, would touch, then Donna and I would kiss, knowing our time
would come when I’d pick her up in my car to go to the drive-in theater. Only months
rather than years away, the on-again-off-again times together since we were eight years
old had become always on, now and forever.
When the carnival left town that summer, it returned each year and still does, but
someone else operates The Octopus, and we never saw Red again. I’ve often thought of
his tattoo concealed beneath his neckerchief and thought of him that summer as my bright
shining star. I wondered what my life might’ve been like had I left town with the carnival
never to return, just like Red.
Fangio’s Pipe
By R.M.Clausen
The car was incredibly fast. The attached airflow vanes and diffuser devices made the seven-speed prototype aerodynamic in its purest form. One engineer called it a rocket ship without rockets. If it weren’t for the wheels, some believe the car might actually soar around the track without touching the ground. With its immense power and torque package, the racing machine seemed more air-worthy than anything constrained by stingy gravity.
The vehicle, of course, was not designed for the feint of heart. The engineers conceived this pulsating griffin for a gladiator. A crankcase-toreador who not only possesses the skill-factor and the unfaltering panache for competition, but can unlock the mystique of speed. Once in the pilot’s seat, these contemporary charioteers then transport themselves to a natural euphoric realm where everything that was before, is forgotten. The common denominator is concentration and anything preceding, was just waiting. For them, the ultimate high is the launching hour, the immediate moment, because life begins when the green flag drops.
Josh Crandle is one of those throttle-jockeys who met the requirements. A synchromeshed persona grata who had earned the recognition within the proprietary membership of the motorsports plunderbund. Ever since he could remember, Josh wanted to race cars. There wasn’t anything more important to him. Racing was his nirvana, his nourishment, and he lived for that moment, for there was nothing else on the planet that he would rather be doing.
When Josh scrunched his wiry frame into the compact driver’s seat of this modified sports car, he was in the now, a stratum zone. A place like no other, where reality competes with the nonexistent. He is an elitist of that narrow partnership that believe excellence is expected. Once secure in the cockpit, the man and his vehicle are one.
Josh steered the racer away from the pit area and onto the race track. He then stabbed the accelerator to the floor, and as the engine roared to life, the vehicle’s burst of speed pressed him firmly back against the seat. He allowed the vibration and motion of the racing coupe to have the subtle control in the steering. Everything was in balance, and even though hurling down a straightaway at 200 miles an hour was exhilarating, he knew it was the deceleration and the braking at the sweeps and curves that would decide the outcome at the finish line.
As Josh approached the sharp right-hand curve at Arnage, the rear of the car wanted to go straight, but he corrected with a quick flick of his wrists. The machine answered and slid back to form, he was in control again. Smooth and proficient, he was like a leopard in the hunt.
Although he navigated the apex safely, Josh knew the race car’s behavior was abnormal. He could feel the handling ebb away with each passing lap. The suspension was out of line, too loose, and it needed adjustment. Disappointed by the performance, he eased the machine into the pits and turned off the engine.
As Josh climbed out of his car, the first thing that caught his attention was a pretty young blonde draping herself over the pit barrier wall. This was practice day and as always, it attracted many various spectators to the paddock area. Besides the eager crew members, there were the concerned sponsors, the perennial VIPs, assorted sexy women, hangers-on, and anyone who wanted to see a
race car and its driver up close.
With an autograph book in one hand, the young vixen waved furiously, revealing a deep cleavage as her breasts bulged against her T-shirt. Josh smiled, her intention was obvious, but he didn’t need the distraction. Something was not right in the handling of his race car. It was not in tune and he was determined to find out why. He began looking for Giff.
Entering the garage area, Josh’s eyes darted above the intrinsic commotion as he searched for his head engineer. Weaving his way past the mechanics who had now surrounded the car, Josh removed his helmet, and stuffed his earplugs and gloves inside. A bespectacled gent in dirty trousers with an adversely clean shirt quickly approached him. Before the man could speak, Josh churned in, “What the hell, Giff! The rear wishbones are out of whack. The car wants to drift in every corner. I thought we had fixed that problem!”
“We had,” said the engineer, with a perplexity in his voice.
“Well the problem’s back!” retorted Josh.
Patience was not one of Josh’s virtues. To him, distractions seem to emerge from everywhere. The race was only a week away and the car won’t work. The 24 heures du Mans is an elitist motor race and draws top-calibre drivers and racing teams from all over the globe. It troubled him that he could trust an ubiquitous and saucy minx that haunts the paddock area, but not a technically superb and skillfully trained crew-member in the garage. He wished it was the other way around. Frustration was creeping into his bones.
With the practice session over, Josh left the track circuit and hailed a taxi back to the host town of Le Mans. The dilemma with his car bothered him. He would have dinner later with Martin and sort it all out.
Late that afternoon, Josh greeted his mister-fixer in the hotel lobby. Martin, a short, corpulent gentleman, was a mender-of-problems, a redeemer, and the executive of the race team’s largest sponsorship. He smiled a lot and laughed easily, and it was reassuring to the team that he thoroughly enjoyed being around the racing fraternity. Josh’s relationship with Martin had always been smooth, and he knew that if there was a problem, this hombre would take care of it.
The weather in France was warm with very little wind at this time of year, and although it was overcast with a threat of summer rain, the two men decided all the same to take in a fresh air stroll together down the Rue Chanzy.
It was hard to ignore the charm of the little city, with the old Roman walls and the Gothic cathedrals, but Josh was not concerned with the old-world allurement. His mind was on his race car, and as they walked, the conversation became a conjecture of the up-coming race.
“I’m down ten points, Martin,” exclaimed Josh. “I need a full complement of team members.”
“The team has three drivers for the race, and every member of the pit crew is top-notch,” answered his troubleshooter. “ You don’t hear Luigi or Jean-Paul complaining do you?”
“They’re not behind in points!” countered Josh. He was sore that the team was going to be missing one crew member at race time.
“His commitment is covered, besides the car will be ready in time,” explained Martin.
The discussion continued and Josh was still on edge as they wended their way back to the hotel. “If I don’t have a complete team, the opportunity is lost,” said Josh. “What if. . .,” but his words trailed off abruptly. He had noticed a small gathering at the front of the hotel.
As they were approaching the hotel’s porte-cochère, a sleek car pulled up. Josh’s curiosity turned to the intriguing vehicle. To drive a beautifully designed car was almost as exciting as racing one. His love and fascination for the sexy contours of an automobile’s body, the intricate framework of the chassis, the potency of the power plant, the delicious colors of the paint, all gave purpose to his life and caressed his soul. To Josh, each marque in the auto world was art’s creation, a fundamental element, where indeed, form follows function.
Josh’s vigilance was now piqued and it drew him away from his conversation with Martin. He didn’t recognize the vehicle’s manufacturer from where he stood, and as a cluster of people pulsated toward the new arrival, he knew he had to see this unfamiliar car that was meticulously drawing attention.
Josh left Martin behind and pushed his way through the gallery of milling torsos like a panicked lemming. Just as he gained access to the curb for a vantage point, the driver’s door opened and a woman’s shapely leg fell out.
Taken by surprise, his attention immediately went to the orphaned limb and the black high heel shoe that was strapped to it. The owner of the eurythmic appendage then slowly spilled from the motor carriage. Clinging to a sensual and supple, whisper-soft female form was a chic, dark green dress so tight that the slit up the side made everyone in attendance take immediate notice. Her naked thigh was revealed, but large round sunglasses concealed the vamp’s eyes. Her long dark, ebony-black hair glistened in the cloudy sky and gave accent to her refined satin-like face. Her lips were red and full, but they did not smile. Elegant and pretentious, the language of the voluptuous woman’s body was all under the watchful eyes of the small crowd. She didn’t speak a word as she surveyed the eager gathering, lingering for a few seconds in the direction of Josh, and then, graceful in her movement, seem to glide across the pavement to the hotel’s entrance. Josh’s eyes were transfixed as he followed her every move. Someone then opened the front door and the lady vanished inside.
Josh suddenly felt euphoric, for he could not feel anything solid beneath his feet. He had no thoughts, no emotions, as his
consciousness was arrested by her spell. She had succeeded in completely mesmerizing him.
Josh felt the tug on his sport coat before he felt the wet drops on his face. He turned his head and noticed Martin pulling at his sleeve. A light rain had begun to fall and the crowd had dispersed. It was as if he were waking up from a dream.
“Are you alright?” asked Martin.
Josh shook his head not only to answer, but to question. He felt like he was standing in a fog, completely encapsulated. Snared by the woman’s magnetism, it was like a narcotic and he craved for more. He did not know her, yet he couldn’t understand this unsurmountable feeling that was enveloping him.
“Who is she?” asked Josh, hoping he wasn’t stammering.
“Who is who?” replied Martin. “You mean that woman? I haven’t a clue.”
“Find out,” pressed Josh. “Please, I must know.”
Perplexed, Martin shook his head, and together the two men trudged out of the rain and entered the hotel restaurant. The unidentified automobile that was weathering the elements, now seemed inconsequential.
After dinner, Josh thanked his host, bade him good evening,
and left the restaurant. It was still a mite early for him and he
had the craving for a nightcap so he ambled toward the hotel saloon
just around the corner.
Dimly-lit, with pockets of amber lighting, it was an alluring lounge. He made his way over to the bar and sat down. Except for the bartender, he was alone in the room. There was soft music coming from somewhere as it bounced off the old stone walls and soaked into the lush carpet.
He ordered a Scotch and then reflected back to the woman he saw that afternoon. It was haunting him. He couldn’t push her out of his head. Who was that ravishing vamp with the enchanted charisma that percolated lust? Where did she come from, and why is she here? How could this temptress lure him like she did? He now had a thirst, a hunger even, that captivated him. He felt trapped, yet wondered if somehow he had been baited.
Josh took a long swig from his glass, and while drowning in thought, failed to notice a wistful, attractive, and curvaceous woman quietly enter the room. She moved effortlessly to the bar and took her seat not far from him. So deep in concentration, he was surprised by her entrance.
The woman did not speak as she drew out a colored cigarette within a flat jeweled case from her small purse. She slowly crossed her leg as the barkeep quickly moved over the bar counter to light her cigarette.
She was incomparably beautiful, with thick dark hair that fell gently past her shoulders. A sylphlike, faintly-colored methyl green dress that she almost wore, poured over her lithesome frame
and cascaded down her bosom, like a waterfall of dripping sex. Her crimson lips pouted, surrendering a smooth, silken face.
His heart almost skipped a beat. It was her, the women he saw earlier that day! Even without sunglasses, he knew it was the same woman. Curiosity seeped from his pores, as he meticulously watched her. More than excited, he scrutinized, eyeing all her smooth lines as if he were going to buy a new car.
There was a certain poise in her carriage. Observing her demeanor carefully, he noticed how purposely she moved, deliberately, deftly, like a violin’s bow.
She took a long drag from her cigarette, blew the smoke out and then turned to look at Josh. Her gaze left him unsettled and spellbound. Beneath her thick nymph-like eyelashes, were piercing, green eyes. For a moment, Josh thought she was looking right through him. It was evident to him this lovely creature was a maelstrom with skin.
“Hello,” she said. The greeting was soft and concise. Her voice was velvety, somewhat husky, but had reassuring essence.
Josh smiled. Her tone was feminine and had the song of seduction. He knew he was smitten.
“Hello yourself,” answered Josh. “May I buy you a drink?”
“That would be nice, thank you,” she replied. She motioned to the barkeep, “Champagne cocktail, please.” She then took a drag of her cigarette and flicked a lock of hair away from her face. Her eyes were sparkling, as a deep smile formed on her mouth.
“My name is Josh,” said the man who now felt bewitched. “May I know the name of the lovely woman I just bought a drink for?” He was no stranger to flirting, yet the subject in front of him left him with apprehension.
“My name is Circe,” she said still smiling. “Would you like a cigarette?”
“Thank you no, I don’t smoke,” replied Josh. “That is a very pretty name.”
“Thank you, I like it,” she said.
“Do you live in the area?” asked Josh. He felt he might as well cut to the chase.
“No,” she answered quietly.
“Are you here for the race?” he queried.
“Oh yes, I’m a big fan of racing,” she enthusiastically replied.
Tantalized, Josh thought now we’re getting somewhere. A woman of charm and grace who loves racing.
“That’s good to know. I’m a driver myself,” he offered.
“Are you now?” she cajoled.
The barkeep then came over and placed her drink on the bar, nodding at Josh.
“Yes, I drive the number six Mercedes,” Josh boasted. Then, with his drink in his hand, he rose and subtly slid over to the bar stool next to her, asking, “Do you know any drivers?”
“I do now,” she answered politely, a grin of perfect white teeth now displayed across her mouth. She took a sip of her drink and then asked, “Do you own any racing trophies?”
“Oh, I have a few,” he said. “They’re good mementos, I guess.”
“Umm,” she noted. “I have a very worthy racing memento,” the woman volunteered.
“Really?” said Josh. His interest was now at full hilt. “And what might that be?”
She continued to smile, and with a pause, took a drag on her cigarette. She shifted on her bar stool as she uncrossed her leg and then crossed the other.
“Do you remember a driver named, ‘Fangio’?” she questioned.
“El Maestro?” exclaimed Josh. He was thinking of the famous Argentine race driver who won so many races and championships many decades ago.
“Si,” Circe snickered. It seemed she also knew the moniker of the Latin racer.
“Juan-Manuel Fangio,” Josh reiterated. “Who doesn’t remember him? Why do you ask?”
“Do you recall when he raced in Cuba?” the woman queried.
“Yes, somewhat, I think,” he pondered. “He raced there in
Havana, before Castro in 1957, I believe.” Josh now began to burn with inquisitiveness.
“He was also there in 1958,” she added modestly. “Only he didn’t race then.”
“Yeah, now I remember,” Josh mused. His history was not top drawer, but he knew racing and its heroes. Josh went on, “He was kidnapped by Castro’s goons for political reasons. He missed the entire race that year.”
“That’s very good, Josh,” she quipped. “You do know your racing.”
Josh took a deep breath. He suddenly felt fuzzy all over. My god, this woman is incredible, he reasoned. He could feel the goose-bumps crawling up his back. But where are we going with this, he wondered?
Fascinated, Josh gently demanded, “What has that to do with your racing memento?”
Circe grinned, taking a last drag on her cigarette before putting it out. She wet her lips and, tilting her head, looked deep into his eyes as she uttered, “I have his pipe.”
Josh’s mind went vacant. He did not comprehend. While he was gazing into her eyes, he almost grabbed the bar as he had the sensation of vertigo. He could feel those large, deep, imperial emerald orbs pulling him into her.
Circe faced back to the bar, took a sip of her drink and then put the glass down before she went on. “Many people don’t know that when they finally released Fangio,” she paused, looked down at her drink and dipped her finger into the glass to briefly stir it before continuing, “they apologized and offered him a box of choice Havana cigars for his trouble.” Circe withdrew her finger from the glass and brought it to her lips. “Only Fangio didn’t smoke cigars,” she continued methodically, “he didn’t even like them. Instead, he asked for and received a hand-crafted meerschaum pipe.”
She paused again for emphasis, and turning to Josh once again, she leaned forward with her intense, penetrating eyes, lustily breathed, “I have that pipe.”
Her words hung in the air. To Josh it seemed like somebody pulled the pin on a hand grenade and he was waiting for the room to explode. Fangio’s pipe! Strange, he had never heard of it before. How did this woman get such a trophy, he wondered? He could not pull away from her ethereal web. He felt she was slowly devouring him.
Circe sat back quietly and sipped her drink. A smirk formed on her face as she reached for her cigarette case and drew out another cigarette. She tossed her head up, as the barkeep rushed over to light it for her.
Josh was in a stupor. He felt a mysterious fire growing within himself.
A passionate flame that was kindling his heart and engulfing him.
It was a distinctive flavor he had never experienced.
He knew it was now imperative that he know more about this enigmatic and inexplicable daughter of Eve packaged before him. He wondered if love is indeed the true dream of immortality.
Josh started to speak but found his voice had failed him. He hesitated to avoid embarrassment, and took a sip of his drink, letting the amber liquid slowly trickle down his throat.
“Yes?” she said, anticipatively.
“Do you have the pipe with you?” he asked.
“Of course,” she answered proudly. “Would you like to see it?”
“Yeah,” Josh burst out. “I mean if it’s not too impolite of me.”
“Why don’t you finish your drink then, and I’ll show it to you,” she enticed.
Josh slugged the rest of his drink down, feeling a twinge of bewilderment, yet with a flare of anticipation. With a glowing smile, Circe put out her cigarette, gathered her purse and rose fluidly from the bar stool.
“I have it in my room,” she said. “Come up with me, I’m staying here.”
Josh slid off his bar stool and immediately went to her side.
They strolled out of the saloon together and around the corner to the hotel elevators. Circe pushed the elevator button and as they stood silently waiting for the doors to open, Josh unexpectedly
felt warm and flushed. He hoped it didn’t show as they entered the lift.
He was impressed when they arrived at the very top floor. Circe motioned to the left as they stepped out of the elevator and then sauntered down the corridor. When they stopped in front of the door to her room, she fumbled for her key.
“May I help?” he asked.
“No,” she replied. “I have it.”
She slid the key into the lock and after a quick turn of the wrist, pushed the door open. The room was inky-black, but it smelled of her. The intoxicating fragrance entranced him as he stood there before the dark.
“Come in,” said Circe seductively, as she slinked into the room.
She flipped on the light switch and Josh stepped forward. The chamber took on a warm glow from a light sconce on the wall across the extraordinary large room. A spacious Persian rug covered most of the polished wooden floor. He spied a small dresser pressed against an adjacent wall near a closed door. An enormous four-poster bed was the most imposing fixture in the room.
Circe turned and quietly closed the door behind them. This must be the Emperor’s Suite, Josh thought. His room was nowhere near the size of this one.
As he turned around to face her, she suddenly reached out and wrapped her arms around his neck and passionately kissed him.
Unsuspecting, he responded vigorously, holding her tight against
him. She slowly released her arms from his neck, took his hand and led him over to the huge bed.
She then bent her arms behind her and unclasped her dress, letting it drift off her breasts and fall to the floor. Undaunted and naked, she pulled the covers of the bed back and slipped beneath the sheets. Her eyes were glazed as she smiled and beckoned him.
Somewhat astonished but eager, Josh knew the pipe was now an afterthought. He immediately followed her lead, shedding his clothes, and joining her under the covers. He heard her sigh as his arm searched for her waist.
She then gently exclaimed, “Oh my dear, we have left the light on!”
“I’ll get it,” he said comfortingly.
“No,” she said softly in his ear. “Let me.”
She released her arm from around his shoulder and slipped it out from under the sheets. Her arm dangled loosely as her hand groped for the floor. Upon reaching the varnished boards, her arm then silently slithered across the room, stretching over the ornate rug toward the opposite wall. Reaching the baseboard, her arm slowly creeped up the wall and stopped just before the light switch.
Her hand located the toggle, and with a quick flick of her finger, the room went dark once again.
Jetsam
by
Gerald Arthur Winter
“I didn’t know she was missing,” the estranged younger sister told him as he
flashed his TPD badge, clipped it to his belt then quickly re-buttoned his blazer. With
a casual shrug she continued. “Our parents died five years ago in an accident on I-4
coming back from Epcot while Jane and I were on Spring Break in Costa Rico. She was
a senior and I was a freshman at USF. Jane went on to grad school in North Carolina--
Duke—but I got a job here in Tampa the week after I got my Bachelor’s degree. Snow
sucks. I’m—like—a Palm-erania.”
He raised his head from his notepad as if his gesture were a question.
The strong silent type, she thought, evaluating his trim build and strong jawline.
“Ya know—like—palm trees . . . my degree was in hotel management . . . at
least that’s what it came down to by the time I was a senior. I haven’t seen or spoken
to Jane since my parents’ funeral. They were cremated and Jane and I scattered their
ashes in the Gulf off Indian Rocks Beach. That final hug was my last contact with Jane.
I’d sent her Christmas cards at the hospital where she was an intern in the North
Carolina Triangle, but she never replied. I’d called a half dozen times only to get
her voice-mail, but she never returned my calls. I gave up trying and moved on
with my life. So be it. Jane has always been The Ice Goddess, no close friends.”
“Sounds cold,” he said, pushing up his sunglasses on the bridge of his sharp nose.
They were at poolside on her day off at the new Plant Hotel where she was the
Assistant Manager. She remained reclined in a chaise lounge and was wearing a tangerine
bikini with beads of perspiration on her tanned skin. She shaded her eyes with her hand,
wondering if her wax job made her Venus mound more enticing. She sensed his stare
through his dark shades, his eyes probably rolling with her exposed abdomen rising
and falling as if her navel were winking at him, maybe teasing him with her intended
lure of sexual provocation.
“Truth be told, Jane is a royal bitch, even to me, her little sister. But I envied
her with that ice princess determination to make it in a man’s world. I’m sure Jane
took no hostages on her way to the top at that hospital in Cary. I understand she’s
become a top surgeon there.”
“She was reported missing forty-eight hours ago by her boyfriend—Hank
Perozzi. Do you know him?”
“Hank? Jeez, I can’t believe she got back together with him. They broke up in
college. He did show up to pay his respects at our parents’ funeral, but I never thought
they’d get back together . . . never.”
“What can you tell me about him? He’s not a suspect, but a person of interest.
Was Jane seeing someone else after their break-up in college? Could there have been
a love triangle? ”
She cocked her head with a swish of her shoulder-length blond hair. “As I said,
I haven’t spoken to her, but I figured she was too intent on her career to have time
for romance.”
“Romantic or not, your sister was sharing an apartment in Cary with Perozzi . . .”
He paused with his index finger to his lips.
“Whatever,” she said with a shrug then sat up and swung both feet to the
opposite side of the chaise and faced away from him. She unfastened her top and
held a tube of sunblock in one hand and cradled her breasts with the other. “Could
you?” she asked turning to look at him over one shoulder.
His shades allowed no clue to his feelings, but he tucked his notepad and
pen in his jacket and took the tube from her hand. There was a long pause as she
waited in silence until his hands touched her back, as warm from the sun as biscuits
fresh out of an oven. His hands felt huge as he made circular motions on her back
with both. Though warm and perspiring, her skin prickled with a chill as he kneaded
her back and shoulders. His thumbs were as skilled as her masseuse at the hotel
clubhouse. She wondered how skilled they’d be if she were facing him, a thought
which made her nipples taut in her own embrace.
“That’s enough,” she said. “Thanks.”
He closed the cap and handed her the tube.
“May I trouble you again?” she said. “Just a simple bow will do. I’m done
for the day.”
Tying her top between her shoulder blades, he said, “I have more questions.”
“I live at the hotel, but I bet you already knew that, Sherlock. An entire suite
of my own overlooking Tampa Bay,” she said, standing and putting on a white fluffy
robe that said “Plant Regency” with orange letters on the hip pocket. She took her
room key and a wristwatch from that pocket. She put on the watch and jiggled her
wrist in front of his face, sunrays bursting from the watch reflected in his shades.
“A gift to myself on my twenty-fifth birthday—Rolex—twelve grand.”
She noticed one of his eyebrows twitch above his sunglasses.
“I’m a loner, no boyfriends, so I like to treat myself right. You coming up to
ask me more questions about Jane?”
“Sure. That’s what I came for,” he said, following her across the pool patio to
the elevators.
In the elevator, instinctively, she sensed his inhaling her hairspray and body
wash scent, maybe something even deeper at her core. He was a cop, a bloodhound
at heart. That excited her. She hadn’t been that aroused for some time. She felt a little
dizzy as he followed her off the elevator on the 21st floor. In the corridor a housemaid
nodded to her with recognition.
“Good morning, Ms. Travers,” the housemaid said with a slight bow. “Fresh
towels in the bathroom as you requested.”
“Thanks, Hillary,” she said. Then opening her suite with the key, she motioned
for him to enter.
“Great view,” he said, walking toward the balcony overlooking the bay.
“Drink?” she asked.
“Coffee,” he said. “On duty.”
“Whatever. It’s almost noon so I’m having wine.” She prepared a coffee
drip, flicked on the switch, then poured herself a glass of chardonnay. “Help
yourself, while I shower and change.”
“Don’t change too much,” he said with a hint of flirtation.
She looked back over her shoulder as she let her robe drop to the bathroom
floor and said with an echo to her voice before closing the door, “Creamer’s in the
fridge, sugar on the kitchen counter! Help yourself! Won’t be long!”
She knew the hiss of her shower was muffled by the closed bathroom door
as he drank the coffee. He’d see only photos of her framed on the walls or standing
on side tables. No photos of her sister Jane or her parents. “Loner” called out from
every corner of her luxury suite. Great management perks would buzz in the mind
of anyone who entered. She wondered what this cop thought of her accommodations.
He turned to her as she returned with her wine glass in hand. “You said you’re
the Assistant Manager, could the hotel ‘Manager’s’ suite possibly be better?” He
asked, sipping his coffee black.
She was dressed for Tampa’s August swelter, a white cotton shift with
silver-dollar-size lavender polka dots, white sandals. Around her thin neck she
wore a white gold chain with a cross, a necklace purchased at the Gold and
Diamond Source to match her Rolex that seemed to shout Happy Birthday to me!
“Last week our manager was transferred by corporate to our new Miami
hotel,” she said, liking his baby blues as he removed his sunglasses and took in her
image head to toe with obvious mutual attraction. “I expect to receive my promotion
to manager by week’s end. This is the manager’s suite.”
“So it’s a given . . . you’ll be the manager. Congrats!” he said, clicking his coffee
mug against her wine glass.
“Nothing’s a given,” she said with a shrug. “Life has no guarantees.”
“That’s a grim outlook for a young woman,” he said.
“When your parents celebrate their twenty-fifth wedding anniversary at
Disney World and come back in an urn, it doesn’t turn you into Pollyanna. I’m not
a pessimist, just a realist.”
“So let’s get real,” he said. “You don’t seem upset that your sister’s missing.
That makes you a person of interest . . . possibly a suspect.”
“Suspected of doing what?”
“That depends on how you answer some more questions.”
“Is Jane—like—dead?”
“For now, just missing. Today’s your day off. Would you mind giving me a ride?”
“Where to?”
“A place mentioned by Hank Perozzi in my interview.”
“The winter rental?”
“Yes. Where your parents came down for the winter with you and your sister
until they died.”
“It’s across the bay in St. Pete. Jane wasn’t interested and asked if I wanted it.
But even with all its benefits, the house reminded me too much of Mom and Dad. I
own it, but rent it out during tourist season. I rarely go there, only when I have to.”
“I’m sorry if it will be painful, but I need you to show me somethings there.
Clues to Jane’s whereabouts . . . or demise.”
“Demise? That seems an old-fashioned word for a young man. What? Thirty?”
“Thirty-three.”
“Three’s a charm,” she said with a shrug, grabbing her bag and keys.
“Okay, Marlowe. Let’s go.
* * *
She drove her white BMW convertible. He seemed uncomfortable in the
passenger seat as they crossed the Gandy Bridge to St. Pete. Her long blond hair
fluttered in the wind and she felt exhilarated to be in control of an Alpha male of
the law-and-order persuasion. So far the weather held up at 93 degrees with a
breeze off the Gulf. When they arrived with the crunching sound of her tires
across the circular, gravel driveway, she pointed to the rental sign.
“That’s my number on the sign,” she said, watching him take note on his
pad. She expected after they’d put this yada-da-yada-da meeting behind them,
that he’d call her for a date. She’d decline of course. Much too busy managing
the hotel after her promotion. But once Jane reared her ugly head from the
shadows and his case was closed, maybe a brief fling with a stone-cold cop with
a hard-body would be amusing if not satisfying.
“It’s late August, so not much interest in Florida until October,” she said,
getting out of the car. “Ya know—too fucking hot.”
His expression seemed to echo that same assessment, but of her—too
fucking hot to handle. “Isn’t being the agent for your parents’ rental property a
conflict with your day job at the hotel?”
“I’m a multi-tasker. I’ve been the rental agent almost five years. Jane had
no interest or the time, so it fell to me. My parents’ life insurance paid off the
mortgage, so after taxes, insurance and maintenance, it’s all profit. Beachfront
brings me ten grand a month October through April. Jane got the rest of the
estate—for now, anyway.”
“Do you mind telling me how much you and Jane got from your parents’
estate?”
“You already know that, and you just want to see if I’m a liar,” she said with
a smug curl to her full lips.
“You’ve been watching too much TV,” he said. “I’m just a flat foot, not Robert
Mueller.”
“Still, you must know that my parents put my inheritance in a trust with Jane
as the secondary trustee if both of my parents were deceased before I turn twenty-six,
which is a week from today.”
“And if Jane is deceased before you turn twenty-six?” he asked as if leading
her toward a confession.
“That’s only a week from now, but the bank would serve as temporary trustee
until my birthday . . . then it’s all mine . . . no biggie—I was told it’s only three million.”
”Nice pay lode,” he said, lifting his sunglasses to prop them on top his head.
His blue-eyed stare felt like a laser. “A clear motive for murder.”
“My time is recorded at work. Until today, I haven’t left the hotel in the past
month. You said Jane’s been missing only forty-eight hours. On the hotel grounds I’m
pretty much on camera 24/7 and I haven’t been to North Carolina since I was a kid
traveling from New Jersey to Florida on I-95.”
“Then I guess that lets you off the hook,” he said. “But I just need you to clarify
something for me on this rental property that could help in my effort to find your sister.”
Relieved to be in the clear, she said, “I have the keys. Whadaya need to know?”
“I want to see the backyard.”
“Sure,” she agreed with a shrug and led him through the front entrance.
“It’s a bit musty, but I keep the A/C at 79 degrees to prevent mold in the off-season
because it’s furnished. The heat and humidity in the summer months are killer.”
He raised that distinctive eyebrow again when she said—killer. His reactive
reflex gave her pause, thinking—I am a suspect.
The furniture was covered with plastic and the air was much cooler than
outdoors in the sweltering driveway. She bent down to remove the bar on the
sliding patio doors’ bottom runner and unlocked the doors to lead him onto a
paver patio. A round table with a granite top and a center hole for an umbrella
had six chairs around it. The umbrella was down and rolled in a plastic sheath.
There was a large Green Egg ® to barbecue on the deck. Across thirty feet of
lawn was a dock with a pram to go fishing on the Intra-coastal Waterway
between Tampa Bay and the Gulf. It was very quiet except for an occasional
shrill of a heron, an egret, or a pelican. The surface of the lagoon was like glass
except when a fish jumped away from a cormorant. Spanish moss hung from
the trees along the banks on both sides of the lagoon.
He kept walking towards the boat slip as she said, “What—exactly--
are you looking for?”
Without turning back to face her, his voice was like listening to a newscast
from a distant room, and the light breeze off the lagoon was like a hairdryer set on
low and blowing in her face.
“This lagoon is brackish water,” he said, squatting on the dock. He skimmed
his hand in the water then touched his fingers to his tongue.
His tone puzzled her. “What’s brackish?” she asked.
“Not as salty as the Gulf, but not exactly fresh water like a lake or pond on
the mainland across the bay.”
She shrugged, wondering, where this line of inquiry could be going. “I guess
. . . but I’m a hotel manager—not an oceanographer. Why does that matter?”
“Like most new Floridians who weren’t born and raised here like I was, and just
got tired of ice and snow up in Yankee territory, you assume like most biologists would
tell you in general, that gators make fresh water their only habitat.”
“Gators? I’ve never seen any gators here,” she said.
“That’s because you’re here only in the summer when there are no tenants,
like now. This is when gators spend all day under water to avoid the heat, then they
hunt at night when it’s cooler.”
“So?”
“Unless you’re on a night vigil, you’ll never see their beady red eyes glowing
in the dark waiting for some stupid tourist to walk her lap dog along the banks.”
From the dock he looked up and down the serene lagoon. There were no
neighbors’ boat slips within view in either direction, north or south, or west across
the lagoon. That’s what her parents had always wanted in their eventual retirement
retreat, solitude surrounded by protected marsh that could only be sold off after
their passing. But hopefully one of their daughters would want to keep it.
“My tenants have never called me about seeing any gators in our lagoon.”
“Either they were oblivious and made too much noise that kept them out of
sight or they were curious enough to view them safely from a distance, maybe with
the binoculars I saw hanging on a hook in the kitchen.”
“Those were Jane’s from when we were kids and used to look for dolphins
and manatees,” she said.
“I know,” he said, still facing away from her where he stood on the dock.
“She told me.”
She felt a chill, even in the tropical heat, but asked the question she didn’t
want answered, “She told you? Jane told you?”
The serenity was shattered by the curt answer coming not from him, but
from behind her, saying, “I told Jeff all he had to do was get you to drive him out
here, so he could leave his car for me at the hotel.”
“Jeff? That’s your name? You know each other?” she asked, backing away
from them, but she stood precariously between him on the dock and Jane coming
toward her from the patio. Startled by Jane’s quick advance, she stumbled back,
falling onto the grass where Jeff held her down. She felt a sudden sting in her neck
then watched Jane remove the hypodermic needle from her jugular. She gasped for
air but felt as if she were having an out-of-body experience. She felt no pain and
everything she saw seemed sharper, the colors all around her more vibrant, the
words said to her so precise and curt like a spoon striking a crystal tumbler--
ting-tong-ting!
“Why-are–you-doing-this-to me?” she asked, her own words seemed to be
coming from her abdomen as if she were a cello. She was confused, wondering if
it was the injection that made Jane look like her, even wearing the same polka-dot
dress. She thought. What’s happening?
“It always has to be about you,” Jane said. “Now it’s about me for a change.”
“What are you going to do?” she asked with a tremor.
“You can scream all you like,” Jane said with that same icy glare she’d had
to face every day growing up.
“Scream? What do you want from me—my trust fund? It’s only three million.
I’ll be manager next week. I won’t really need it. Take it! I don’t want it.”
“You must have been eaves dropping on Mom and Dad talking about your trust
fund years ago, but you misheard . . . it was thirty million fifteen years ago now ninety
million—too much to slip through my fingers next week. I still have heavy student loans
from med school. I need that money more than I need a sister.”
“I always knew you were a monster, Jane. What are you going to do to me?”
“Me? Nothing but watch. That’s why I needed Jeff.” She nodded to the police
detective.
“He’s a cop! He wouldn’t—” she stammered.
“You mean this?” he said opening his blazer and unclipping the badge he’d
shown her earlier at the hotel pool, but now held directly in front of her face. She
saw it was just a dime store toy that said: “Sheriff of Dodge.”
She wondered. How could I
th a whir and a staccato rumble.
“No need to flinch,” Jane said. “You won’t feel a thing. But you’ll see it all. First
your hands and feet to draw the gators.”
She watched the saw sever each hand and foot with a spray of blood in her
face. How could she not feel it? What was in that injection Jane had put in her neck?
Jeff threw her hands and feet into the lagoon with four light splashes then
a loud heavy splash, then another, and another . . . gators coming for their appetizers.
Then the saw cut off her forearms at the elbows and her calves at the knees. There
was no one to hear or see the sanguine spectacle in the lagoon.
“We’ll leave her forearms and thighs attached so she can watch the gators
rip them off,” Jane said. “The drug will keep her conscious and we’ll keep her head
above water with a lifejacket from the boat. She’ll bleed out, but her mind won’t
know she’s dead. It’s a drug used on the Iraq battlefields to get information from
our soldiers fatally wounded who could still provide field intelligence even after
they were declared dead.”
She could smell Jeff’s nervous sweat as he dragged her to the pram and
put the orange lifejacket around her remaining torso. Less than two hours ago
she’d been leisurely sunning herself in a tangerine bikini. Now she couldn’t wait
to die.
Jeff’s pants were soaked with her blood. He tied a rope to the lifejacket
and tossed her like jetsam off the dock into the lagoon. He got into the pram and
started the motor. The pram dragged her torso across the lagoon then he tied the
rope to a palm tree on the opposite shore. She bobbed like a bottom-fisherman’s
float on the surface of the lagoon. She was beyond screaming, but totally conscious
as she watched four gators, none less than nine feet long, cutting across the lagoon
like battleships on the Pacific in a World War II documentary.
She called out to Jane and Jeff with her final words, “They’ll be evidence!
DNA! You won’t get away with this! You’ll pay with your lives!”
“You must have been too busy at the hotel today to watch the weather
report!” Jane called back to her sister. “Category 4 Hurricane Jennifer will wipe
out this coast in twelve hours with the next high tide and full moon. You’ll just
be a minor statistic of the disaster.”
Jennifer? She thought as she watched them get in Jeff’s car and leave
her BMW behind as evidence that she’d been there. How ironic—the hurricane
is named after me.
The alligators unhinged their sharp jaws and fought over her remains.
The sky darkened in a prelude to the approaching tempest.
There really are monsters in this world. Please, God, she thought, let
there be none in the next.
Bringing in the New Year
Six 6-Word Stories for 2019
By Gerald Arthur Winter
Mom’s legacy, faithfulness, breeds my tolerance.
My withheld embrace stores wondrous fulfillment.
Loves me—pregnant—loves us not.
Honoring my committal he chooses another.
My belly swells sapping freedom twofold.
Tears, a touch then kisses much.
Fireworks and Holiday Cookies
By Roy Dorman
“I think I’ll make some homemade cookies for the Trick-or-Treaters this year,” said Martha Evans to her husband Wilbur.
“Is it Halloween already?” asked Wilbur. “I thought it was just the Fourth of July. Time flies, don’t it? Seems like you just took me to the fireworks.”
Actually, it’s been three years since Martha has taken Wilbur to the fireworks. His dementia has spoiled all the fun in that type of outing, and except for grocery shopping, Martha and Wilbur mostly stay at home.
“I thought kids didn’t accept treats that weren’t store-bought anymore. Ya know, because of all the incidents with razor blades and poison.”
Martha sighed. Wilbur still had a good day now and then and it looked like this was going to be one of them. It only made what she had decided to do more difficult.
“Do we even get any Trick-or-Treaters anymore?” Wilbur continued. “It’s been a while since I remember any comin’ to the door.”
Wilbur was right. It had been a while since Martha had put on the welcoming porch light for the neighborhood kids. She had stopped doing it after the Halloween Wilbur had screamed obscenities at the Marston kids from down the street. He had insisted they were robbers dressed up like children so they could get into the house. Martha still apologized every time she ran onto Mrs. Marston.
***
Martha had seen the belladonna plants off the roadway earlier this fall when she had gone for a walk after sedating Wilbur for his nap. She admitted to herself that the sedation was more for her benefit than Wilbur’s; she had to have a little alone time now and then.
At first she thought she should call the county’s roadway people and report the plants; they were poisonous and very close to the shoulder of the road. Some kid could pick the berries and get sick or even die.
Martha didn’t call anybody. Instead, she pulled a couple of the plants out by their roots and took them home. She never really liked kids all that much anyway.
***
“That house on Maple Street is ripe for the pickin’,” said Bobby Woods. “It’s just two old people livin’ there who probably have some cash stashed away for emergencies.”
“What about all the kids on the streets?” asked his side-kick, Lenny Dawson. “We’d stand out like sore thumbs on Trick-or-Treat night.”
“So we wait until about ten o’clock; all the kids are back home before then, right?”
“Yeah, I suppose so,” said Lenny. “And we sure could use some easy money.”
***
Martha didn’t make dinner that night. If Wilbur asked she could just pretend they had already eaten and offer him the cookies if he was hungry.
She put a half-dozen cookies on a plate from the basket by the front door and led Wilbur upstairs.
“Time for bed, dear,” said Martha. “Have a couple of cookies with some milk; it’ll help you get to sleep.”
“Did we have any Trick-or-Treaters?” Wilbur asked.
“Not a one this year; must be that Halloween is losing its popularity as a holiday.”
“We’ve got a lot of cookies here,” said Wilbur, looking at the plate on the nightstand. “Are you going to have any?”
“Oh, I will,” said Martha. “I’ve still got a couple of things to do. You have some now and get into bed.”
Having missed dinner, Wilbur tore into the cookies with gusto. Martha watched him with tears forming in her eyes. She would have some cookies, but she would wait until after she was sure Wilbur was dead.
***
Martha heard glass breaking downstairs. It sounded like it came from the kitchen.
She cautiously went down the stairs with her cell phone in her hand, ready to call 911.
When she got to the bottom of the stairs, Lenny and Bobby jumped into the hallway from the kitchen and Bobby knocked the phone from Martha’s hand before she could finish punching in the number.
“Give us all your money and any valuables and you won’t get hurt,” said Bobby.
“I’ve got less than a hundred dollars in my purse for groceries; that’s all we have in the house.”
“You’re lyin’,” said Bobby, slapping Martha hard in the face. “You must have some cash here somewhere in case somethin’ unexpected comes up.”
“Geez, Bobby,” said Lenny. “Don’t be so rough; she’s an ol’ lady.”
“A lyin’ ol’ lady, “said Bobby, cuffing Martha again. “Where’s the money, honey!”
Martha was frightened, but she also was angry. “There is no money other than what’s in my purse, you stupid man.”
This time Bobby hit her in the jaw with a closed fist and knocked her onto an umbrella stand in the hallway. The circular stand had sharp ornamental spikes on it and Martha fell onto the stand face first, dying instantly.
“Are you nuts!” yelled Lenny. “Ya mighta killed her.”
Bobby spit on the back of Martha’s head. “So what if I did? Now let’s get her purse and get the hell outta here.”
“Ain’t we gonna look for the money they’ve got stashed away?” asked Lenny.
“Lookit this dump,” said Bobby. “She wasn’t lyin’; they probably live on the Social Security checks they get each month. There’s the purse over their on the table by the front door; let’s blow this pop stand.”
“We killed somebody for a hundred bucks?” said Lenny. “If we get caught I’m singin’ like a canary.”
“A hundred bucks and some cookies,” said Bobby, grabbing a handful of the cookies from the basket next to Martha’s purse. “Trick-or-Treat, right?”
“I want half the money, Bobby; you can have all the lousy cookies,” said Lenny. “Eatin’ something that was made by a dead person seems creepy.”
***
“Your labs guys did real good on this one, Harry,” said Detective Michael Storm. “There was a lot goin’ on with this one, more guilty parties than innocent ones, and finding that saliva in the victim’s hair put Bobby Woods at the scene. That was enough to get Lenny Dawson talkin’.”
“Yeah, Lenny sure lucked out when he didn’t eat any of those cookies. Martha Evans put enough belladonna berries in those cookies to kill a goddamn horse.”
“It’s a good thing no kids stopped at the Evans’ house tonight,” said Detective Storm. “That would have been a real tragedy.”
“You’re right as rain there, Michael. Some houses just don’t deserve to be on the Trick-or-Treat route and that house should have been taken off the list long ago.”
BROTHER FIDELITAS AND SISTER PRUDENCIA
A Fable Of Two People In Two Places
By Roger D. Hicks
Once upon a time, in a tiny river valley in Western Europe, there lived a man and a woman. They were known as Brother Fidelitas and Sister Prudencia. Each belonged to a small, strict, and very private religious order. Brother Fidelitas was a monk. Sister Prudencia was a nun. Their orders were located in two small branches of the river valley that were separated by a mountain. The members of each order had no contact with the outside world except as dictated by the necessities of obtaining the supplies they could not produce on their own. On some days, in winter-if the weather was right, members of one order could see the frail, dissipating smoke of the wood fires of the other order rising over the mountain that separated them.
In this way, the nuns and monks were aware that the others existed in a similar solitude just over the mountain. Their self-imposed isolation made these devotees seek to ignore the fact that others, in many ways like themselves, lived just across the ridge. The nuns and monks lived, worked, and sought enlightenment within a few short miles of each other and ignored the fact that it was so. Brother Fidelitas and Sister Prudencia were positive examples of their respective orders. Each worked to be accepted and admired by their comrades. Each did the work assigned to them and sought more to prove their commitment to the order. Their days were filled with work and neither thought of anything except being a part of the community in which they lived.
Sister Prudencia tended the gardens of her order and raised many of the vegetables they ate. Her work took her outside the walls of the convent on many days into the surrounding grounds as she dug in the good, warm earth to produce food for her sisters. She did this common work with a glad heart and smiled at her successes. A large crop of potatoes, abundant cucumbers, plentiful beans all could make Sister Prudencia smile. They were her achievements. They were the way she measured her success. Along the edges of her vegetable garden, Sister Prudencia also raised a few flowers. They were the only concession her order ever made to beauty or frivolity. A few of the flowers had a purpose in helping keep away bugs from the garden. A few others could be used to produce simple medicines for the nuns. But quietly, Sister Prudencia also raised her beloved pansies simply because she loved pansies. They rose up and bloomed at the edges of the garden and Sister Prudencia smiled.
Brother Fidelitas also worked outside the walls of his order to produce much of the food they ate. He was the caretaker of their chickens, rabbits, and ducks. Brother Fidelitas worked to protect the animals from the weather, the foxes, and disease. His good work also provided sustenance for the members of his order. In a small corner of the poultry house, Brother Fidelitas also kept a few pigeons. Like the pansies of Sister Prudencia, the pigeons had no real purpose. But, in their flights high over the monastery, the pigeons made Brother Fidelitas smile. As he worked among the animals, Brother Fidelitas would occasionally glance toward the sky to watch the circling, peaceful flight of the birds. It did not occur to the monk to think that the pigeons, in their flight, could see the pansies of Sister Prudencia.
As the nun and the monk continued to live and work in their cloisters, each gained more and more respect from their peers. Their faithful, simple work earned each of them accolades of the type that simple people give. An older nun might smile as she ate potatoes from Prudencia’s garden and say, “This is a fine potato, sister.” A monk might make a similar comment as he dined on one of the products of Fidelitas’ coop. The nun and the monk received these compliments in the only manner that was acceptable in their orders: silence. For them to have shown too much appreciation of even simple praise would have seemed unchaste and ungodly. Above all, the members of each order sought to be chaste and godly. Their lives, their very souls were dedicated to godlike chastity. The manner in which Brother Fidelitas and Sister Prudencia received these simple compliments was duly registered and approved by the members of their orders. Each was found to be worthy of the respect of their peers.
Each of the orders found it necessary to send a member to the small town near the mouth of the river once a week to purchase the supplies they could not grow. At nearly the same time, after years of dedicated toil, both Sister Prudencia and Brother Fidelitas were chosen to serve as the auxiliary supply purchaser. The orders viewed these as very serious responsibilities and the person chosen to fill the job was required to be an exemplary member of the order. By going to town on market day, these people both exposed their neighbors to the people of the orders and were exposed themselves to the temptations the town had to offer. These supply purchasers were carefully chosen by their peers and then trained in the position by the regular purchaser. No member of either order was ever sent to town alone for many months in order to make sure that they were not tempted by the allure of the community and its people. Sister Prudencia and Brother Fidelitas each made a few trips to town with these older teachers when the work of the orders was light and their presence not needed at home. In this way they learned what should be bought-salt, medicine, simple tools- the necessities of a simple life. They learned from whom they should purchase these things and whom they should avoid. The nun and the monk were gradually prepared for the time when they might be needed to do this job alone.
Finally, the time came when each of them was sent to purchase supplies alone for the first time. The winter had begun and the garden of Sister Prudencia was empty of work. The animals of Brother Fidelitas were safe in their cages. The valley was swept by a sudden influenza and many of the people were sick in their beds. Such was the case with the nun and the monk who had trained Prudencia and Fidelitas for just such a day. They left at nearly the same time on market morning and trudged toward the town with the meager products that each of the orders produced for sale-a few hand sewn garments, some baskets, some products of the fields. Each also carried a small amount of the money of their order to purchase the supplies for which they could not trade.
The nun and the monk arrived in the town and began to shop for the things they needed. Each moved through the stalls of the vendors silently, softly, speaking only to conclude a purchase. Each was striving and succeeding in being a positive example of their order. They both arrived at the stand of a dealer in medicinal supplies and began to search the shelves for the few simple remedies that might heal their brothers and sisters. Suddenly, Brother Fidelitas was stopped in his
search by the sound of a voice that asked the seller the price of a particular medicine. Brother Fidelitas had heard women in the town before. But this voice was different, softer, and compelling in a way that Fidelitas had not experienced since before he took his vows at the monastery.
The monk looked up and saw a beautiful, young nun dressed much like himself in the simple frock of the order. The clothes concealed her body. Only her face was visible. But the face was so special that Fidelitas could not explain to himself what he felt. He was somehow breathless, frozen, and could not have spoken if the occasion required. The nun looked only at the shopkeeper, listened to his answer, chose a small amount of the medicine, and left the shop. Brother Fidelitas wrestled with a sudden desire to follow her to the next shop. But he remembered the teaching of the old monk who had brought him to town before. Brother Fidelitas had been told that such a thing might occur, or that a town woman might even attempt to draw him into trivial conversation, or even worse. The young monk had been well prepared by his teacher. He controlled the urge to follow the nun, bought the few things he needed and left on the return trip to the monastery.
Brother Fidelitas did not see the nun again and concluded his business in the customary efficient and timely manner. He bundled the purchases and unsold products of the order in his hand sewn backpack and began the journey back up the valley toward home. As the monk walked, he watched the sky and realized that a storm was moving in over the ridge ahead. He prayed for safety on the way and realized that a similar storm was also moving in his heart and head. He remembered the face of the nun, the soft questioning voice, the chaste way she had shopped and left the town without his having seen her again.
Fidelitas struggled with his thoughts and walked on into the face of the building snow storm. He suddenly remembered a time when he was in the home of his parents in another valley more than a hundred miles away. He had been sixteen and his father had sent him to town on market day to sell a few rabbits and return home. Fidelitas had followed his father’s orders that day just as he had followed the orders of his abbot today. He had gone to the shop of the butcher and sold his rabbits quickly and quietly in preparation for leaving the town. But that day, so many years ago, another young woman had come into his senses.
The daughter of the butcher had followed the young Fidelitas out of the shop and spoken to him in the way he only now remembered. The soft insistence and offering of her voice had led him away from his plan and he had followed her to a shed in an alley behind her father’s shop. She had told him of things he had never heard explained. She had showed him emotions, sensations, smells, tastes, and touches a young farm boy soon to be a monk had never experienced. He had exulted in the rolling tide of sensations she brought him and left the shed with a collection of emotions he had never felt before.
But the memories of the butcher’s daughter did not bring pure pleasure to the monk as they had on that first day so many years ago. Now Fidelitas examined the memories both in the light of the teachings of his order and in the additional memory of having returned home to find the
pockets of his poor farmer’s pants empty. The butcher’s daughter had exacted a price for her teachings. She had stolen the coins from the sale of the rabbits to her father. Fidelitas remembered the beating when he told his father the truth. He remembered being brought to the abbot as a novice a few weeks later. He remembered the years in the monastery since that wonderful day in the butcher’s shed and the guilt rolled over the monk much as the snowstorm rolled over the mountains into his face.
The clouds had built rapidly, pushed by a steadily increasing wind. The temperature dropped quickly and the snow came in a driven fury as the monk pushed on against the building drifts and distressing memories. Fidelitas struggled against the storms in his world and his soul. He felt the sting of the snow and ice on his face where his hood did not reach. He felt the sting of his father’s words and lash. As he struggled to walk on, the monk smelled the coldness of the valley in his nostrils. He remembered the frigid goodbye at the door of the monastery so many years before. And yet, somewhere deep inside he also remembered the honest, soapy, work induced aroma of the young nun and realized that in the shop he had not even been aware that she had an aroma.
A quarter mile in front of Fidelitas, Sister Prudencia was also struggling in the storm. She pushed determinedly against the rising snow and also found turbulent thoughts and feelings pushing into her mind. Sister Prudencia remembered the face and voice of the monk in the druggist’s shop. As the shopkeeper had weighed the meager medicine for her, for a single moment the nun had glanced across the room and under the cowl which covered the head of Brother Fidelitas. Sister Prudencia had been warned by her mentor about the men of the town. She had never been warned about the men in the monastery across the mountain. She too pushed against the snow and wind while simultaneously pushing to force the unexpected thoughts of the monk from her mind. The storm was coming on more forcefully. The snow deepened quickly over the knees of the nun. The wind cut unceasingly through her hand-woven garments. She began to believe that she could go no further. Suddenly in front of the nun a row of three trees appeared and Sister Prudencia remembered an abandoned farm house and knew that she must seek shelter from the storm.
Sister Prudencia struggled between the trees and up the snow laden path to the open door. She pushed her way into the dusty room and continued to struggle with her thoughts as she sought objects in the room which could be used to save her life. There was no furniture but the door was secure and the windows were shuttered. Only a small amount of snow and ice had blown in the open door and between the cracks in the board walls. There was a fireplace in the rear wall and the nun instantly remembered that she had no matches or other means of creating fire. Sister Prudencia searched the room and her heart simultaneously.
Her encounter with the young monk had shaken her. She had not expected to see a man in the town who would arouse these feelings. She had not even believed that such feelings existed in her. Prudencia had come to the convent when she was sixteen after her parents had died in an earlier epidemic which swept the valley. She had been brought there by the farmer whose family
owned the labor of her parents. She remembered him and how she had hoped on that day that he would not leave her with the nuns. The face of the farmer crept into her thoughts just as the face of the butcher’s daughter had overcome the monk who struggled in the snow a quarter mile away.
The farmer had allowed the young girl to live in the meager home allotted to her parents for several weeks after their deaths while he considered his options. He had come to Prudencia each day and talked to the orphaned girl of her life, his farm and dreams, and the problems they both faced. Prudencia had come to believe in those days with the farmer that her life would progress in a different manner. And then, after the farmer quietly decided that a better marriage to the daughter of a neighboring farmer was possible, he had brought her to the convent and gone quietly away. Just as surely as the butcher’s daughter had robbed Brother Fidelitas, the farmer had robbed Sister Prudencia.
The nun searched the house for any object she could use to save her life and in the blinding storm the monk struggled on up the valley step by step until he managed to stumble into the line of trees and remember the abandoned farm house. As Brother Fidelitas pushed his way to the door, the nun was gathering a few small pieces of wood from the floor and found an aged cup which had survived the abandonment of the farm. She was searching her backpack for a few bites of food and an unsold blanket when the monk pushed open the door.
Sister Prudencia gasped but cut off the rising scream when she realized that the snow covered robe could only be worn by the monk from the shop in town. At the sound of her surprise, the monk stopped and said, “I am only a monk of the brotherhood nearby and I cannot go on in the storm. May I stay for the night in your home. I did not know this farm was occupied.”
Sister Prudencia overcame her shock and said, “I am a nun of the convent. I, too, am seeking shelter from the storm. Do you have fire?”
The monk did not reply verbally but dropped his backpack and shook the snow from his robe. Then the two worked quietly together to find the objects which might save their lives. They added a few more small pieces of wood to the meager pile near the fireplace. Fidelitas began to search his backpack and withdrew an unsold candle and a container of matches, one of few concessions his order allowed to modern convenience. Prudencia dug in her burden to produce an unsold blanket and a small chunk of crude goats’ cheese from her lunch. Fidelitas found half a loaf of bread saved from his noonday meal and the paper in which his purchases had been wrapped. Together the monk and nun worked to build a small fire and, as it kindled to life, both realized that they had been spared by the storm.
As the darkness of the continuing storm enveloped the house, the monk filled the cup with packed snow for water and set it near the tiny fire. The nun cleared a spot as near the hearth as possible and spread the blanket with the food nearby. The monk lit the candle and placed it on the mantelpiece. The warmth and light spread over the two, yet seemed to fill only a small portion of the room. A circle of light, soft, enveloping, pristine seemed to surround the couple on the blanket. In the eye of the continuing storm, Fidelitas and Prudencia were warm, safe, isolated, and alone
together. If either of the two ever realized the unnatural aspect of their sharing a room, a meal, and a blanket neither expressed it.
They shared the fire, the bare sustenance of bread and goats cheese, the chalice of water, the blanket. And as the night progressed, they shared their souls. The conversation, at first halting and unsure, seemed to swell and grow until it encompassed everything each of them had been or known before that night. It seemed that before the blanket covered them and the fire protected them they knew each other completely, unequivocally, and in a manner that was sacrosanct and sacred.
When the morning light awoke them, Prudencia and Fidelitas moved rapidly to leave the fire. The blanket was returned to the backpack from whence it had come. The candle was placed in the pack of the nun and became an unspoken memorial in a tiny collection of personal possessions. The cup moved to the pack of the monk and then to an exalted spot on a shelf near his beloved pigeons. They left the house in single file walking slowly under the snow laden nave into which the trees had been transfigured. The monk broke a trail up the valley and across the pristine land it had become. The nun followed silently and gradually fell behind to a chaste and acceptable distance before Fidelitas turned up his own little road to the monastery. Prudencia moved on the short distance to the convent.
Both would remember the storm and the night as having been natural, comfortable, and perhaps ecstatic. Neither ever spoke of that room, that storm, that night, that experience again. In the minds and hearts of the nun and monk, the room, the fireplace, the meal, and the blanket became a sacred moment. The ancient cup became a chalice used only once in a sacramental act. The candle on the mantle may just as well have been placed on an altar. The storm became the hand of the God they strove to please. The night became their most sacred memory. The house became a shrine.
San Sebastian’s Ghosts
by
Gerald Arthur Winter
At age twelve I had a crush on Sally Baker, but realize now as an adult just how deep my
affection had been for her thirty years ago. Even from my preteen perspective, I’d been well
aware that Sally was the best looking cheerleader who all the senior boys at Apachalaca High
School wanted to take to the prom. But that one night long ago, Sally needed my protection
from the horrors we’d have to face together at the deserted O’Grady mansion and haunted
Fort San Sebastian on Gator Island just a mile off the Nature Coast of north western Florida.
With her good looks and straight A’s, Sally had been pre-pledged by a local sorority at
Apachalaca Community College where she intended to enroll as a freshman next September.
However, the key to her pre-acceptance for next fall’s sorority entry was to spend Halloween
overnight in the O’Gradys’ master bedroom with a clear view of the gallows in the courtyard
of the 16th century Spanish fortress.
The creepy antebellum mansion had been charred by fire a few years ago. Though arson
was suspected and investigated, no evidence came forth with the cause of that conflagration
attributed to lightning. The suspicion of arson had been based on the controversy over the
preservation of the historical site as a Civil War landmark in addition to the fort’s attribution
to the Spanish galleons who’d built the fort as protection from the French and British fleets
attacking from the Gulf of Mexico. The fort had been completed only five years after the
Spanish established St. Augustine on the east coast of Florida. There had been protests in
town against the restoration of the site, especially by the local African American community
because of the history of slave abuse by the mansion’s occupants’ who’d built the mansion
in 1850 beside the remains of the Spanish fort predating the mansion by 280 years according
to its cornerstone marked “1570.”
Spanish moss hung from the gnarled weeping willows surrounding the mansion’s
warped structure like head-dressed witch doctors prepared to raise the dead on All Hallows
Eve. On that the full moon October night three decades ago, locals still expected 16th century
zombies to rise from the adjacent slave cemetery. The graveyard’s moss-covered head stones
leaned at odd angles with the names of the dead worn away by hurricane winds and tropical
torrents over the past centuries.
The oldest date on a headstone in the cemetery was 1555 with the name of Jamuaja, a
fifteen-year-old girl enslaved by the Spanish who died in childbirth with her unnamed daughter.
The most recent date was 1865, a Negro boy of nine, as the headstone indicated, who’d bled to
death when his arms had been amputated for tapping the master, Seamus O’Grady’s daughter
on the shoulder to warn her about an alligator swimming toward the shore where she’d stood.
The controversy over the site as a Civil War monument sparked heated debate because,
toward the end of the Civil War, many slaves had been brought to Fort San Sebastian to be
hanged, as was often the case, but also to be mutilated first for any attempts to escape. When
word of the Confederacy’s surrender came to Seamus O’Grady, he sped up the process of his
personal genocide. It was this horror that gave the fort and the mansion the curse of wandering
spirits unable to resolve, even in modern times, any sustaining retribution for the atrocities
thrown on them.
The sorority to which Sally Baker wished to pledge her allegiance were all descendants
of the O’Grady clan and had to do their DNA due diligence for any consideration even before
GPA, talent, or good looks were considered. Though I had no clue at the time, they’d also
become an inbred lot with all marriages showing O’Grady DNA without any trace of what
they referred to in private as “NB.”
Sally was my next door neighbor and had agreed to watch me overnight while my
parents were still on a road trip for my ill grandmother being moved to an assisted living
facility in Atlanta, Georgia over 200 miles north of our sleepy Florida burg. After I’d gone
out trick-or-treating for the last time in my adolescent life, Sally and I watched some
horror movies from 5:00 to 11:00 p.m., which included the classic black-and-white flicks:
Frankenstein, Dracula, and The Wolfman. Then we capped it off with Burnt Offerings
in color, which was enough to make a grown man shrink in fear with Betty Davis eyes
popping out of the aged actor’s head.
“I can hear Mrs. Allardyce on the third floor,” Sally said, trying to scare me. “I’ll
have to bring her tea and crumpets so it’s bedtime for you, little man.”
Sally liked to call me that, but I felt a tingling sensation from somewhere at my core
that had become active only recently, but seemed to reverberate that night like a Buddhist
gong with the scent of Sally’s hairspray wafting every time she came within reach. But the
thought of a creepy old woman in our house, like Karen Black in Burnt Offerings, gave me
an icy chill like a cold steel blade through my spine.
When Sally noticed me staring at her she said, “Go upstairs to your bedroom now.
But don’t expect me to tuck you in. My how you’ve grown over the summer. How old are
you now?”
I lied, telling her, “Thirteen.”
“Oh, yeah. You’re too old to be afraid of vampires and werewolves, so you just go
and tuck your little-man self into bed.”
“How about a kiss goodnight?” I asked with disbelief at my courage, but she seemed
unfazed by my outrageous proposal.
“Have you kissed any girls in your class?” she asked, standing from the sofa and folding
her arms tightly across her bosom. “I bet you haven’t kissed anyone but your mommy.”
I blushed and stammered, “Well, I—that is, there was this one—”
“No one! Absolutely no one,” she challenged.
I just shrugged and hung my head until I felt her index finger under my chin, which
she used to tilt my head upward to face her. Wow! She smelled great and her eyes were
hypnotic, turquoise like the Caribbean.
“Wh-what are ya gonna do?” I asked, afraid she’d tell my parents of my bold
inappropriate behavior, which would surely prohibit Sally from ever coming over to our
house again.
“If you promise never to tell anyone—not ever—that this happened, I’m going to
show you how to kiss a girl the way she’ll never admit she wants you to.”
“But I thought you were gonna—”
“Shut up, little man, because this is the only time you’re ever gonna kiss me, so don’t
slobber and just do to me what I do to you. Got it?”
I thought surely I’d pee in my pants or fart, but the first taste of Sally’s lips and the
sweet warmth of her breath made me feel like I’d been drowning forever and she was
breathing life into me like a paramedic on an emergency rescue mission.
Once I got the hang of it, she pushed me away and said, “Whoa-whoa-whoa, little man!
That’s it. You’re on your own now. But you’re ready to thrill some high school girl before you
ecven finish eighth grade.”
Of course I was only in seventh grade, but what did that matter when that night would
already stay in my memory forever? But that was before I was watching from our second-floor
landing as she talked on the phone to one of her girlfriends. The conversation was about her
Halloween sorority initiation on Gator Island at the O’Grady mansion. Then I heard Sally sneak
out the backdoor. At the time, the only thing I knew about the O’Gradys or Fort San Sebastian
were rumors at school and overheard conversations between my parents about the Civil War
landmark controversy.
I couldn’t believe that Sally was going to leave me home alone on Halloween night
and take off for Gator Island. She was eighteen and I was twelve, so I figured there must be
some kind of rule or even a law against her leaving me on my own with my parents out of
town. Jeez. There was probably even some kind of regulation about getting kissed by a girl
her age—girl? She was a woman and I wasn’t even a teenager yet. Maybe they’d go easy on
her since I’d lied to her about being thirteen.
I quickly dressed in jeans and a polo shirt and slipped on my sneakers without socks
or tying the laces. Then I pursued her across the empty lot behind my house toward the
marina. No thoughts about the scary rumors of Gator Island, the O’Grady mansion, or Fort
San Sebastian even entered my mind—only Sally’s safety—with her kiss lingering in my mind.
I figured a guy should never let a girl who kissed him like that ever get away. Besides,
everyone knew Gator Island was just a joke on tourists. There hadn’t been a gator sighted
there in over a hundred years, or so I’d heard at school. Kids often dared others to swim the
half-mile to Gator Island, but I’d never heard of any takers. If there were, they’d probably
drowned rather than being attacked by an alligator.
I could hear Sally rustling through the scrub foliage in the empty lot just thirty yards
ahead, but I was gaining on her. When she got to the Marina on the Intracoastal Waterway
between Gator Island and Florida’s Gulf shore, she was met by two other girls, maybe a
couple of years older than her. I couldn’t hear what they were saying to one another from
where I hid behind a boat in dry dock. They helped her into an old 20-foot garvey, flat with
a covered area at the center as protection from, sun, wind, and rain.
The two girls waved to Sally and she waved back. The other two got into a car and drove
away. I thought they’d be going with her, but Sally started the engine with a cloud of exhaust
and a roar.
She’s going alone, I thought. Then, like Scooby-do, I barked, “Yoiks!”
I waited only a moment as Sally unfastened the lines from the moorings and pointed the
rickety craft toward the full moon on the horizon backlighting Fort San Sebastian and O’Grady’s
mansion silhouetted against the moonglow.
I ran toward the boat with Sally facing in the opposite direction and the engine’s
banging blocking out any other sounds. I leaped ten feet from the dock to the boat just as
Sally accelerated the engine, which masked the jolt of my weight in the garvey. The center
shelter concealed my presence on the boat, and there was a canvas tarp at the stern which
I used to cover myself and conceal my presence from her as she steered.
It was only a ten-minute ride to Gator Island where Sally had been instructed to
moor the craft till morning or to use for her escape if the O’Gradys’ or tormented slaves’
ghosts scared her off the island before daybreak.
Never mind Sally, I thought. What about me? Too late to turn back now and I can’t
let Sally face this scary stuff alone. I had to protect her tonight to prove that I deserved to be
called more than just a “little man.”
The other girls had given Sally a list of places on the island where she had to go and also
of certain things to bring back to show them that she’d followed their instructions. It was more
than just an initiation; it was a scavenger hunt as well. Now I knew I could be more than just
Sally’s protector. I could help her gather all she needed to join her sisterhood at college.
Maybe I’d earn another kiss. The warmth of that slim possibility kept me from shivering loud
enough to be heard by Sally steering the boat to the dilapidated dock between the mansion
and the fort.
I watched her tie the boat to the dock then squint at her written list by the shimmering
moonlight casting its silvery glow across the rippling tide.
“I can help,” I said, tossing the tarp aside.
“You little creep!” she shrieked. “How did you get here?”
“I followed you and jumped from the dock into your boat as you were heading here.
Let me help you, Sally.”
“You, help me? You must be kidding, little man.”
Ugh! There it goes again. I had to prove to her that I was worthy, that I could be her
hero that night.
“Don’t act so stuck-up,” I said, which made her cock her head and glare at me. “I’ll tell
all the guys on the high school football team that you French-kissed me.”
“You little creep,” she hissed. “They’ll kick your butt.”
“Come on, Sally. Let’s find the stuff you need on that list,” I said as if taking command.
“Okay, I guess,” she said. “But don’t think this will get you another kiss.”
“Don’t be too sure, Sally.”
“Ugh! I’ve created a little monster,” she said. “Come on. We have to go to the master
bedroom in the O’Grady mansion until midnight.”
I looked at my watch. “We’ve got only ten minutes. We better hurry.”
Sally’s list told her to enter the mansion through the wine cellar which was creepy
with spider webs tickling our faces in the dark and vermin scattering from our path to the
creaky wooden steps to the first floor kitchen where rats were on every counter and
scampered between our feet as Sally shrieked.
When we found the stairs to the second floor it felt with each step as if we’d fall
through the rotted wood into the basement. An oil portrait of Master Seamus O’Grady
hung on the wall beside a canopied bed. His shimmering turquoise eyes glared at us from
1865 when the Union Army hanged him from the gallows of Fort San Sebastian in the
courtyard below.
“I have to watch from here at the stroke of midnight,” Sally said, going to the
balcony with me right behind her.
Whether our imagination or not, we turned to each other as we heard the chimes
from the fort’s watchtower beginning the count to midnight—1 . . . 2 . . . 3 . . .
When the chime came to 8 . . . 9 . . . 10, Sally grabbed my hand and squeezed it tight.
She was ready . . . so was I.
Below we saw a dozen men and women ready to be hanged. At the stroke of
midnight came the loud snap of the trap doors beneath the feet of the condemned and
their amputated corpses hung from nooses in the sea breeze. I shivered when I heard
what sounded like alligator grunts and hisses coming from the mote surrounding the fort.
I turned to Sally as the full moon cast its glow across my face showing her my
turquoise eyes. She leaned toward me as if she were going to offer me a tender kiss,
but she drew her fangs and sunk her teeth deep into my neck making me one with her,
and one with the O’Grady clan forever. My parents must have been in on it with Sally
from the get-go, all of us cursed with no rest for our weary souls condemned forever
to relive our infamous past.
When cats go missing
By Meg Smith
Wet leaves were plastered to the brick sidewalk.
It had rained for three days.
At a bus shelter, amidst an archipelago of graffiti, was a poster: LOST CAT.
The cat, named Sammy, was a plumpish tabby.
In a photo, Sammy was plopped on a cushion, his eyes closed, not appearing at all like the errant, adventure-going type.
The poster, rippled from the humidity, said Sammy was microchipped, had been missing since the beginning of May. The poster included a phone number.
It was one of several posters of Sammy appearing around town, in store windows, in a coffee shop, on the bulletin board of the library.
Many who saw the poster would snap a photo on their cell phones, and distribute to their friends on social media or email group.
This was not the first time many of them had done this for a lost cat or dog poster.
Sammy looked truly majestic and serene in his picture setting. The thought of such a content, easy-going cat out in a downpour such as this, away from a loving family, caused pain in more than one heart.
In a modest duplex home, Sammy’s owners, Carl and Beth, were rising, going to their respective jobs, and returning at night, greeting each other with spare words, the silence of their grief between them.
Sammy had been gone for two weeks now.
Sammy’s very being in their household was a significant milestone.
He arrived about two years earlier, then not much more than a kitten. He was one of a fluffy group of orphaned kittens, found abandoned in a box near the Collingsville commuter train station, and taken to a Caring Paws, a shelter.
Sammy and his littermates were bottle-fed by volunteers, and their availability for adoption announced in the local newspaper as well as on social media.
Carl and Beth had had a quarrel, a serious one, and not the only one in those fragile first months of their relationship.
It was hard now for either of them to remember much about the fight, except that Carl’s ex-girlfriend, Cindy, kept interjecting comments in their social media exchanges, usually when it concerned a restaurant.
Beth insisted Carl rid himself of her -- as a social media contact,
as a presence in his life.
Cindy and Carl, hadn’t seen each other in person since high school.
She was a remnant of the past, Beth argued. It mattered not that Cindy had been there when Carl’s mother had died of esophagus cancer.
That had been kind of Cindy, but that was in a different lifetime.
Let -- her -- go, Beth said.
With a sharp sigh, Carl did.
Then, at an office cookout, Carl’s coworker
Ben mentioned that Cindy had emailed Carl at work.
Beth told Carl to leave. He did for three nights, staying at his father’s house -- two men now without partners, in a dark, chilly ranch house across town.
Carl did not know how to make amends.
He could have asked his father, but his father was caught up in his own struggles, with solitude, with diabetes.
Cindy had remained a friend to his family. His ties to her were mostly of gratitude.
They went to the junior semi-formal, and that was when things ended between them.
Now, they were both in their mid 20s, both with adequately-paying but marginally satisfying jobs.
Their paths had diverged.
Carl’s life revolved around his work at Motor Dynamics, and around Beth, who worked in customer service in a department store.
He didn’t fully understand Beth’s discomfort about Cindy.
But he did remember his father’s one bit of advice about keeping a harmonious household: Choose your battles, otherwise you will lose the war.
He wanted the repair whatever harm he’d done. And, he wanted to win the war.
He knew Beth liked cats. He liked them, or could at least tolerate them. Seeing the Caring Paws’ post on social media, he went there, applied for adoption, and was accepted.
He went home with Sammy, now fully weaned and ready for solid food, in a cardboard, portable cat carrier, with a blanket and some toys.
To Beth, Sammy signified a milestone that made her heart overflow. Sammy spoke of permanence, of a commitment to the present. He brought the two dissonant parties together.
They could officially call themselves a family.
Two years passed, uneventfully but with stability and logic. Sammy grew affectionate, and, given more to naps than running around, he grew generous in girth.
Then, one night, Carl left his phone on the coffee table; it lit up, and Beth picked it up to answer it.
It was Cindy. Her name flashed on the phone screen. Beth grabbed it, answered it, and heart a shocked breath followed by silence.
Beth sat on the couch, feeling light-headed. She remembered how a coworker had grimaced, then forced a smile, when she said Carl had come back to her
and got her a cat.
She felt flushed, absurd, and amazed at her own short-sightedness, at her heart given over so quickly because of a cat.
Carl came into the living room, eating from a bag of pretzels. He then saw her face.
He turned, and went to the door. That’s when the rage exploded inside Beth.
Carl opened the door, and before either of them could stop him, Sammy, who never showed the slightest interest in the world beyond his warm abode, departed in a pudgy, gray blur.
The next day, Carl created the ‘lost cat’ poster at work, and put it on social media. Without alluding to the phone call fiasco, the post simply said he and Beth were heart-broken and wanted Sammy back.
Carl also posted the notice to a ‘lost cat’ group, and ‘help find my pet,’ among others.
It was only then he realized the scope of the problem. So many posts about missing pets, especially cats. Dogs could be leashed of course; cats seldom were.
So many posts said, “he/or she is an indoor-only cat, not used to the outdoors.”
Two weeks passed.
From time to time, someone would send one of them a photo, in a text message, asking, “Is this him?”
It never was.
Sammy knew all about missing. He knew all about missing time.
He knew all about grief, life and death, because he’d been through it all before.
He carried within him generations of names, and generations with no name.
He carried within him, dingy alleys, sunny meadows, a cold, bitter December with the clatter of horse hooves rushing by.
He carried time.
Sita, the missing gray-blue cat, also carried time.
As did Rina, the spunky calico.
And there were others.
As the rain fell, they sought shelter inside derelict buildings, under boxes, anywhere that held out the promise of a dry space.
As the rain ceased, they came out.
Some were very attached to their human companions; others were possessed of a preternatural indifference.
Sammy was not eager to leave Carl and Beth. They were, apart from the dimmest memory of his fellow orphan siblings, the only true family he’d known.
It was clear that they loved him.
But it was also clear that they were constantly rebuilding a house that kept disintegrating.
All the cats knew one thing: Every house would soon disintegrate.
They came to their gathering place. It was in a clearing, behind the former chair factory for which the town had once been known. There were shallow rainwater pools in the uneven, warped lot.
Cars splashed by on the road.
The cats gathered around a fire.
They had summoned the fire.
From the fire, they summoned their ancestor.
It was a truly primitive creature, more like a cat’s skeleton in the thinnest veneer of skin and fur. To a human, it may have looked like a proto-being, stepping out of a zoological display case to survey a world from which it was removed by about 33 million years.
The cats gathered around were all vessels of time, but not caught up in quibbling about the passing of years.
Houses were disintegrating, and rivers would start to stumble backwards.
Everything would start running backwards.
The clouded air above Collingsville, above what had once been a mid-state industrial hub, grew dense with the certainty.
A yellowed moon above glowed dispassionately.
Following their ancestor, the cats tred a narrow, sure path,
in the falling, yellowed light.
Cape Perpetua
By Levi Gardner Bilderback
Perpetual churning
Begs to be fed.
Crash after crash
Wishing you were dead.
She could only stay up for a quick breathe,
Struggling madly against a quicker death.
-Verses from a Sailor’s diary
Yachats, Oregon
12:23 AM Wednesday, October 3rd
Dusty Miller was a biker through and through. He had been part of the Gypsy Jokers until very recently, when his older brother Chip was gunned down
by the Portland P.D. Dusty currently resided in a town called Yachats (pronounced Ya-hats) where he had been getting loaded up on crank, going on drinking binges, and biking up and down Highway 101. This night had been no different, and Dusty barely stumbled out the front entrance of his favorite establishment in Yachats, the Blue Whale Diner.
He shouldn’t have been sneaking drinks, but his judgement was already fully impaired, so it didn’t matter to him at the time. What mattered was that he needed to calm his nerves. He ordered orange juice after OJ, and poured shot after shot from his vest pocket flask. He was pretty casual at first, for someone on meth, but eventually the waitress caught on and told him to leave for good. Dusty complied and took a few steps out of the entrance, put a cigarette in the corner of his mouth, and brought the flame of his Zippo closer.
But before he could light his cig, he heard a rustling in the bushes near where his chopper was parked. The lighter, mere centimeters from the fag, paused in its ascent. Its flame flickered casually as Dusty scanned the bushes, the cigarette twitching as he muttered to himself. It’s the goddamned meth, he thought and lit his last cigarette. He climbed onto his chopper, strapped his Nazi-esque helmet on, and cranked his metallic beast to life. The headlights on the bike illuminated the bushes nearby, and for an instant, Dusty swore he saw a shadow dip behind a tree.
Goddamned homeless, he thought, though ironically he was also technically homeless.
Ignoring the shadow, he rolled his chopper to the edge of 101. South and to his left lay Cape Perpetua; north and right was the direction of the beach he had been staying at. However, as Dusty swiveled his head north, all feeling left his face and limbs. Fog had descended like a wall and it crept silently south, toward ol’ Dusty. The line of clarity on his path was slowly disappearing into the fog, and as he stared in shock at this seemingly natural phenomenon, he could see dark shapes like a crowd of cloaked humans clustered and creeping along with the mist.
Having earned a one-way ticket South, Dusty gunned it, his chopper cutting the silence that seemed to be swallowing everything up. He checked his mirrors once he was up to speed, and much to the dread of Dusty, the mist and dark figures seemed to be keeping up, even appearing to gain on him. Dusty had been through many terrifying moments with the Gypsy Jokers, but this was different. For one thing, he was absolutely alone. For another, he had never believed in the supernatural, and since this mist and the shadows appeared, his entire world of what he knew went kaboom and left a crater the size of his pituitary gland in his brain. It wouldn’t be long until this damnable fog surrounded him and then what? Dusty didn’t want to think of the conclusion, so instead he twisted the throttle until he was up to 75 before he checked his mirrors again. Any minute, he would be
hitting some serious corners along 101, and at the speed he was going, it would mean almost certain death for ol’ Dusty “Eat Dust” Miller. He snuck a glance at his mirrors and saw nothing. Fucking nothing! He eased off the throttle, to take the threatening corners coming up, cig still in the corner of his mouth, tip red and puffing. He let out a chuckle. This kind of paranoia happened when he was on meth, and he should have expected something like this to happen.
As he drew closer to the corner of the Devil’s Churn, Dusty felt something sting his left ear. Automatically his left hand shot to his ear and swatted at whatever it was that had stung him. Suddenly his right ear lit up in pain, followed by three stings in a row under his helmet. Then he saw whatever it was that was stinging him. What appeared to be large, black hornets were swarming all around his head, dive-bombing in and biting chunks out of his face. He could feel them crawling around in his hair, biting and stinging as they made their way further under his helmet. His right hand shot up and he struggled madly with both hands to get his helmet off. His speed had started creeping back up after the first barrage of stings, and now, with both hands off the handlebar, his speed was pushing 80. Having that cruise control throttle had saved his hands from going numb on many long trips, but this time it bit him hard as his speed went up and up, and his path took him careening straight toward the corner overlooking the Devil’s Churn.
He screamed while he struggled at his helmet, finding little success in removing it. Panic had taken hold and all good sense had disappeared. The helmet shifted over his eyes as he approached the corner, his trajectory aimed cleanly between two trees overlooking the Churn. His tires left the ground just as his helmet came off. Dusty’s body came off the bike, his helmet over his head by a foot, and as if in slow motion, all three flew in a beautiful arc toward the opening of the Devil’s Churn. The ground grew larger, his demise nearer. He saw the shadow creatures all around him again, and he could sense their excitement. They were hungry for him. His bike, now 6 feet in front of him, hit the edge of the ancient lava flow and bounced into the opposite wall of the devilishly narrow inlet, and was swept away into the greedy ocean. Dusty fell just short of the edge with a devastating crunch, not bouncing an inch. His helmet hit the rocks, cracking in two and spun off to join the chopper to be pulverized into oblivion.
Amazingly, Dusty didn’t die immediately upon impact. Blood poured from his orifices, bubbling up out of his mouth. He gasped for breath. Meth had caused a lot of problems for him, but this time it seemed to be extending the life of his mutilated body. As Dusty reeled from the ruin, a dark figure moved into his view and his panicky feeling returned full force. If Dusty could have looked around, he would have seen a crowd of well over 50 of these shadow demons all closing in around his body. This sudden shock of panic sent him into cardiac arrest, his heart
finally calling the quits, and the shadows took this as their signal. With a gust, the phantoms flew into Dusty’s body.
For a moment, nothing happened. Dusty’s face still had a concerned look on it. All was quiet, save the continuous pounding of the waves. Then, breaking the silence, crunching sounds came from Dusty’s body as it rumbled in the spot he had landed. Minutes went by before the sound and motion stopped. Sluggishly, the body of Dusty stood up. Its shoulders moved up and down as a rattling breath wheezed in and out. Shambling, Dead Dusty’s commandeered body walked further South along the beach where it found a big, concrete culvert. Piled up like bleached bones outside the drain, nobody would find a body here with all the driftwood. Into the dark opening the body crawled, the creatures inhabiting the body plotting their next move in this ripe and new dimension.
Our 100th Issue Winners
The Autumn Melodies Short Story Contest
1st Prize
WELL WISHES
By Kent Rosenberger
Most people would have some sort of grand reaction if an amazing array of sapphire sparkles just appeared in the middle of the room and produced a full-sized human being, much less one with multihued butterfly wings, aquamarine hair and an all-too-cliché magic wand topped with a shiny silver star.
But for Evenly, such outlandish occurrences were pretty much an everyday practice lately. “Hello, dearie,” the ninety-two year old white-haired, wrinkled bag of bones stated with grandmotherly kindness as the pastel, life-sized fairy took full form. “Have you finally come to take me away?” Perplexed, the fugitive from a girl’s bedroom bookshelf wondered for a second why she was not being greeted with the standard amount of disbelief, but rather placid
acceptance, almost as though she was expected. It took a moment for her to understand her confusion. Judging from the woman’s age and condition, her anticipation of a supernatural being was not entirely unfounded. She was simply not the one the woman was looking for. “No, no, not at all. I am not the Grim Reaper.”
The senior citizen was unable to snap her bony fingers, but she tried anyway, failing to produce any kind of sound whatsoever. “Oh, drat. This must be another one of those delusions.”
“Excuse me,” the fairy asked. “Delusions?”
“Oh yes. I know you’re not real. My daughter says I suffer from…now let me get this straight…” she paused, breathing heavily as though talking this much was winding her, “‘dementia, amnesia, and bouts of vivid hallucinations.’” She grinned, the dentures she forgot to clean for the last few days providing a dingy, artificial smile. “Yesterday I played ping-pong with the mailman and a brontosaurus.”
“Oh, how fun,” the fairy exclaimed, twirling around in a shower of glitter, not completely understanding the disturbing complexity of what the woman was telling her. “Well, I assure you, I’m quite real, and I’ve come to bring you something even better.”
“You have?” Evenly asked, her round eyes amplified in her inch-thick eyeglass lenses. “Cotton candy?” she speculated hopefully.
“No,” lilted the fairy. “Hold out your hand.”
She complied without question. “Is it a button? I do so love buttons.”
“No. Better.” She pulled Evelyn’s hand out palm up and placed the shiny star wand tip in the middle of it. When she lifted it away, a small brown metal disc that looked like it was older than the woman was left behind.
“What’s this?” She held it up to her face until the tiny object came into focus. Her confused mind searched for the word associated with the item. “It’s a piggy. No, that’s not right. A princess. Oh, I get so confused.”
“It’s a penny.”
That word made sense. “Yes, it is. A penny.” Her excitement faded. “Why are you giving me a penny?”
“This is not just any penny,” the fairy exclaimed as excitedly as a child receiving an ice cream cone, “it’s your penny.”
Evelyn inspected the thing resting in her palm. If she did not know it was there it would have blended in nicely with her liver spots. “I appreciate the sentiment, honey, but a penny isn’t worth anything.”
The fairly gigged so much, a blast of sparkles shot out of her nose. “No, silly. I’m not giving you just a penny. I’m giving you what goes with the penny.”
Somewhere in depths of the codger’s muddled mind a golden moment of clarity shone through in association with her newly acquired treasure. There was nothing with it as far as she could tell. “I don’t understand, dearie.”
“Don’t you remember,” the fairy half-sang, “you and Calvin Roberts and the wish you made at the wishing well that summer evening before the first day of school?”
Suddenly, Evelyn did remember. The ancient, forgotten event unlocked from a dusty corner of her addled memory and was brought to the forefront with amazing crystal clarity. “Yes. Yes, of course. It was the day before seventh grade. We had just spent a beautiful summer together, full of picnics and fireflies and days by the pool. We wanted it to last forever. We never wanted summer to end. We each threw a coin in the wishing
well and made a wish.” She stared at the coin in her hand with renewed wonder. “My penny!”
“And your wish,” the fairy added. “I’m so sorry, I’m so far behind in my schedule, but better late than never, right?”
Evelyn scrunched her already deeply creased forehead. “My wish?”
“Yes, of course. Now as I recall, Calvin wished for summer to never end and you wished for the two of you to live forever.”
“Yes, that’s right.”
“Well, I’m sorry to tell you this, but Calvin died years ago, so his wish cannot be granted, but yours is certainly still available.” She waved her wand three times in a circle, producing a series of pink swirls in the air. When she finished, she thrust the colored cloud at her target. It exploded across Evelyn’s gaunt body soundlessly.
The woman dropped the penny and stared at her midsection, then up to the fairy. “What happened?”
“Why, you’re immortal of course. Now you can live forever and have all of your dreams come true.”
“Immortal? Who wants to be immortal when they’re ninety-two? I’m just ready for it all to end now. Don’t I get anything else with it? Youth? Strength? A new body? Do I get to go back to being twelve again?” “Of course not silly. Well, I’ve got to run. More long-overdue wishes to catch up on. Ta-ta.” The fairy began to fade the same way she entered, a shower of sparkles engulfing her frail form.
“But why not?” Evelyn cried out after her, the fragment of her common sense that remained unable to fathom a thousand lifetimes of enduring the constant aches, relentless tiredness, numerous medications and mounting financial problems she had. “For God’s sake, why not?”
“Because it wasn’t part of the wish,” the fairy answered.
With a spotted, wrinkled finger she pushed her coin back in the direction of the fading supernatural creature. “What if I wish for it now? Please?” She flashed her stained dentures as innocently as possible.
“Sure.” The starry tip of her glittering wand touched upon the coin, passing it back into her possession. “I’ll add it to the list. See you again in, oh, eighty-four years or so,” she chimed before vanishing completely.
2nd Prize
OFF THE GRID
by
Teresa Ann Frazee
In a chamber that resonated muffled rock music from the room adjunct to hers, a woman sat at her Victorian desk, awaking her imagination, just as she had 167 years ago. Lace banded her wrists. Her alabaster fingers, jeweled with stones, held a writing instrument, a quill . It seemed an extension of her slim hand as she guided the quill across a sheet of paper, while she created worlds where creatures are far more interesting than their masters. As she wrote, she rearranged her thoughts. Coiffure hair crowned her head, her face had an expression of sensibility, her eyes, of a woman with an intriguing past. She stopped writing, utterly satisfied that she had been sequestered by compulsion and her creative mind had succumbed to the diversity of her talent and she was unable or unwilling to give an account of her imaginations whereabouts.
The drawn back drapery of the finest burgundy velvet, revealed the only window in her chamber, an ivy edged, large window, overlooking the east. Her gaze lingered as she peered out, as if to reward herself for just a moment. She seemed to look upon her view as if it had caught her attention for the first time.
It was neither day nor night. Dismantled time had found it's place. Scatted summer yellow light, reflected the verdure of a spectacular English garden, along a canal with aisles of trees, where rootless branches grew cascading orange blossoms, bearing tiny topaz leaves that held their alignment with perfection. Like a pearl, a full moon illuminated winding cobblestone pathways, where granulated amber light was strewn. In a boundless veil of fire ablaze in the realm of gold and sapphire, a starry blue sky radiated with synchronicity. Amid the aerial blue, a flock of doves cooed with chant of paradise. Bathe in the haunting back lit sky, like white smoke, they rose past phantasmal space into flight. Under an ineffable light that bore an ancient heat, their stray shadows flew in ghostly rhythm , stalking with primitive certainty, before descending into thickets of wind swept grass where sparks from the trampling hooves of white horses flickered.
Far off, were scarcely visible mountains where summits with Sabbath white textures and the valley beneath, had eternally moving clouds curling into mysterious shapes where thick ocherous mists rose from a distant river. Ebony silhouettes echoed the coast, reflecting on the water like crystal. In the haze of the sun, the horizon vanished toward distant spheres of space where wisps of light had spun. A warm breeze dismissed the past, establishing the authenticity of the here and now.
As if in slow motion, time ceased to meddle, here it never rained. Outside her window, it was always the height of summer. A vista to fall upon your knees in awe. All like some fantastic scene, illuminated with the veil of elegance, resonant of Romantic Painters.
A sunny web of openwork from the draperies trim formed a shimmering, filigree pattern where reflective light poured over a plush carpet. Like a mirage in heat, energy circled around blending into soft colors in the kaleidoscopic air. The atmosphere in her chamber was filled with an ambrosial scent. Every now and then she would inhale and savor the aroma with a faint smile of pleasure. A quiet satisfaction radiated from her as if it was that of an infants first breath.
The rock music had stopped. She picked up her quill and continued to write. As she wrote, her eyes skimmed over the written page to seek new translating words which best conveyed her ideas. She heard rustling outside her door but didn't bother herself to look up as she continued to write, using her imagination to form things unknown. Someone timidly knocked on her door. She stopped writing and glanced toward the door.
"Yes, who is at my door?" she asked.
Leather creaked when she rose from her seat . The accumulation of fabric that formed her dress fell about her. The pinched gathering which composed the train of the heavy hem of her refined embroidered gown swept up a cloud of gold dust in the air as she walked to the door. You could see from her elegant manner, she was not lacking in culture. And the floating smoothness of her gait was as if the very lightness of the air was somehow relieved of gravity, making it difficult for her feet to move upon the ground.
"I could us some help!" a young man, said aggressively from behind the door.
The woman opened the door and said:
"Ah! I presume the new arrival". She smiled and shook her head., "Not again" With a deep breath she continued, "Did they not greet you at the gate? You cannot make bohemians, especially those two beat poets, remain at their post. We are such an unruly lot."
A confused young man ,wearing a skimpy T-shirt with a blue bandana around his neck, balanced himself on his boot heels, stood in the doorway with an acoustic guitar slung across his back. He looked back outside.
"Who, at the gate?" he asked.
He had a rock star's physique. His hair dangled around his face. In his gestures, there was a desperation that interrupted his thoughts as he hung on to his guitar, like a security blanket.. He had a intimate connection with his guitar that blurred the distinction between man and instrument, seemingly, there was no gap between the player's body and the wood. The woman looked up at him, pointed out the door and tried to help him understand.
"There on the road. Oh, the way those two renegades have relentlessly carved into the gate with their words. "
The young man eyed her suspiciously and asked, "Who are you? What am I doing here? What's going on? I don't belong here !"
"Please do come in and compose yourself! For sir, you do deserve to be here. Let me assure you, you are in the right place. Do not let fear and confusion compromise your thoughts", declared the woman.
The young man entered the room but he stayed near the door, left it open and looked around. He nervously shifted his guitar from side to side and replied:
"Easy for you to say lady."
The woman sat back in her chair, and said:
"I can see your eyes express anxiousness and that you expect to be informed by me immediately of where you are and how you have arrived here. Most certainly, this cannot be done so quickly but listen patiently and you will easily perceive why you are here. I will not attempt to convey everything, that is not my role but will simply relate the circumstances. By no reason of order do I occupy the first room. It is merely by chance. I am by no means the Director of this community and can scarcely appoint myself as leader. Here, we are all equals, aged, adult and youth, only those who have had the opportunity to develop their uniqueness, including all who are or not recorded in the book of fame. Nevertheless, I will continue since you are now in my room. The explanation is not really difficult. It is simply this. In the order they have been asked, I will try to answer your questions. I am a woman of the 19th century, the daughter of two prominent literary celebrities. Raised in the circle of my fathers advanced intellectual companions, I was supplied with the ability to transcribe the ideas of a cultivated mind. When I reached the age of potential I believed I must prove worthy of my heritage. Waned from waking dreams, quill at the ready for a spine tingling tale, I daily exhume from my imagination wretches and ghosts, the fulfillment of which I eagerly seek. Now, you know who I am, I'm------"
She was interrupted by a knock on the door frame. Both the woman and the young man looked to see who was there. An older woman dressed in a black kimono and scarf around her head, saw the woman with a young man and shouted in the room:
"Hello, Mary. Oh excuse me, didn't know you were entertaining guests."
"That is quite alright Georgia, please do come in.", said Mary.
Georgia stood by the door as she spoke. "No, no, just wanted to remind you of my artist reception tonight. You remember the opening?"
"Most certainly, I will be there. So where is Stieglitz this fine afternoon?" Mary asked.
"Oh you know him, he's in the dark room with Man Ray. I'll see you later Mary." Georgia said as she walked away from the door.
"Farewell!". Mary said.
The young man gestured to the door, "Wait a minute, wait just a minute. Was she---
Man, this can't be", he said as if asking a question, "your Mary Shelley."
"My dear boy you have deduced correctly," Mary said.
The young man asked, "And the music I heard before coming from the next room, suppose that wasn't a recording but the real thing."
"Ah, the music that pulsated through my chamber wall, in a sphere of symphony, those echoing songs chase the shadow of the end of time. I dare say my boy, again you have guessed right," Mary said.
The young man slowly walked over and sat in a chair next to Mary who was still sitting at her desk. He carefully set his guitar against her desk, covered his face with his hands and placed his head in his lap.
"Do have a seat." Mary sarcastically said. She looked over to the door and said a little annoyed now:
"I wish those two would man their post." Mary composed herself and spoke more calmly. The young man raised his head as she continues to speak, "Forgive me, we do not gain all virtues when we pass through the gate. I know it feels much like a strewn puzzle with missing pieces as the ghostly ruins of memory are drawn into the quicksand of time. The sympathy of a stranger, such as I am can be but little comfort to one with such anxiety. But I also know the suspense is a thousand times worse than the actual events. The truth triumphs over all the curiosities one can invent. It is with considerable difficulty that I remember the origin of my own arrival. Upon reflection, I do recall, on examining my dwelling, I found that I had everything I could ever need. A short period elapsed before I settled in to my surroundings. As you are now, I was extremely baffled at first but by degrees, the forgotten importance of how I arrived here, receded into a woven nest of midnights past."
The young man started to pace the room and burst out angrily," OK OK, but damn it, just tell me where in God's name I am? What is this place?"
Mary said angrily, " Please do not abuse the King's English in my room. With my usual candor, I must express that I have no tolerance for the omission of manners. I will not have it. I dare say, you will learn to respect our differences."
"What are you my mother?" the young man said sarcastically.
"Thankfully not. I would indeed have to chastise myself for doing such a horrid job of child rearing. Now, as I have stated before I am doing you a courtesy my boy. I will remind you, it was I who was imposed upon by you, an unannounced guest in my room. Do sit down ! I will again, try to widen the mental scope for you," Mary sternly said.
The young man consented to listen and sat back down, "I need a glass of water."
"You think you do out of force of habit. That will fade. Here, you don't need food, drink, sleep nor any of those human traits that interfere with creativity. I know it is customary to offer a glass of water to someone distressed but believe me when I say that water is the last thing you need." Mary said.
"What's that supposed to mean, water's the last thing I need?", the young man asked.
"You are not mentally deficient. I will not spare you, for eventually you will remember these events yourself. Like confetti, memory will stream through, littering the haze of space. You met your demise wrestling for a breath . Your air neglected lungs hoarded more water than a body could sustain." Mary replied.
The young man tightly closed his eyelids as if to shut out a horrid memory and calmly interrupted Mary, "Stop. Yeah, yeah, I remember now. Weird, my shoes are still wet. But how did you know?"
"Alas! I did not know but surmised the particulars after I saw the tracks of water you left upon my floor as you walked across to have a seat. My beloved husband met his fate in much the same way. He arrived at this community many years prior to my own and his hair is still damp. Hm! Quite the conundrum. I promise, you will hardly notice those little annoyances here above the skylight of floating dreams and think of it as once ago existing among the dregs of scattered thought," Mary replied.
"I get it now. So is this heaven or hell?," the young man asked.
"Neither, my dear fellow", Mary said, "you are home, rooted in a perpetual place among your peers, where the creative spirit is remembered always and never laid to rest, reborn above a hurling flame across the sky. We dwell in a resurrected Bohemia where our immortal bones are no longer obsolete. You have entered a nameless world, radiated with synchronicity as disassembled time forms its own space."
The young man resumed pacing, "But why me?" he asked, "I'm not famous like a star with one name. I don't deserve to be here. I'm just a singer/songwriter that plays guitar. Granted I was on that boat to sign a music contract but still."
"Your attitude is immature but evidently your gift sufficiently impresses. As I have previously stated, famous or not, to creativity we are bound. You will soon understand that with precision we weave threads of infinity wound from a master spool vast and measureless. So my young friend, you underestimate yourself, you are not finished. Can't you see, you have a fire in the soul? Your best work is still ahead of you. There is nothing to distress you now in our aerial habitation, suspended in the spotlight of spontaneity. Certainly, you would be misplaced cradled in eternities contrived rest. For the true artist, lack of passion becomes a bore and ultimately fatal to the imagination." Mary said.
As the young man sat back down he asked, "If this place is so great, why is there a gate to keep us in?'
"You are mistaken. The gate is not there to keep us in. We are not held against our will and can choose to leave anytime. But no one ever does. The gate is to keep spectators, for those whom it hurts to think, those contrived followers with sensibilities inferior as those apparent in dullards, out. Basically those good people of heaven with the sentiments of greeting cards whose diversities are sound asleep. Without a doubt happiness is over-rated in a place where the unconditionally content call home. From the standpoint of art, the records prove their pedestrian lives have been absolutely without interest. Their legacy reduced to a sod covered box of dust and faded words on granite. But we sit upon the intellectual throne where actors live a thousand different lives and musicians such as yourself, bring enchanted music to our ears. This resource for insight with an interconnection with the vastness of the universe, encourages the poet's wit and the painter to wet his brush. We renegades arise from our cold beds of corroded stone, once again move our cold feet, spared from monotonous rest. From secret entrances to a waking world, we the creators of our time leave our print, here in the place we reside. We slide homeward across a hundred years, while the idle with stiffened, sleep-worn postures lie in oblivion, we roam about with unaging grace, as our prophetic words fall from our tongues. So you see, the power of art can remake any world.", Mary said.
"You know a lot about this. Did you start the community?" the young man asked.
"Oh, certainly not. The event on which this place was founded has been suppose by the earliest member, as a most intriguing occurrence. You must have serious faith in your imagination to fully grasp the paradoxical way in which it is told. An artist had passed away and the circumstances on which the story rests was that there was not a place in heaven for someone so individualistic. So the person in question, understanding the nature of his own artistry, founded his own Utopia, therefore perusing ideals, for the continued development of talent, offering a counter-voice that is spoken against anti-individuality. Rather than disrupt heaven and challenge its terms, values and practices, he thus founded a terrain to be inhabited by a new breed of denizens. In doing so, embarked on a courageous course of action to redefine heaven, outside the realm of mortal view where myriads of swirling suns dance with systematic grace and all tomorrows bleed into the edge of perception. Serendipity realizes its moment", Mary replied.
"Really? Is that true? "asked the young man.
Mary rose from her chair, strolled around the room and said:.
"Please do not interrupt me in the middle of a sentence young man "
"You're right, I'm sorry."
"Ah! I see we are getting somewhere. Apology accepted. In any case, I do not wish to dwell any further now on this truth or perhaps absolute myth."
"Please tell me more about where I am," said the young man, urging Mary to comply with his demands.
Mary sat down, took a deep breath and glared at him.
"Please Mary."
"Very well, as you wish." sighed Mary, " In an infinite space not specified by the monitors of time, is where we live. Far away, off the grid, in an unrealized world. We are hidden in a membranous labyrinth of space, adrift in suspended choreography lingering on a passage held secret above the reach of weightless dreams in foolish men's heads. We are in our own Bohemia beneath the twisted inky shadows where Muses keep vigil. Encouragingly, they guide us from our restlessness and bring idle wits to their senses. Stimulating our imaginative spirit, weaving the passions of creation with artistic concepts we had almost forgotten and lost to a waning memory. Through boundless stars of unexplored galaxies we found a direction in a corner of our own Eden. If you listen very closely you can hear the whoosh of us colonizing collectively, transforming our expressions into perfect harmony. Down where the hollows overgrown by the sands of time the restless unleash a thunderous cry loose in which only the Bohemian born can relate. Eternally we thrive between the collaboration of madness and the divine. Such is the history of this community. "
The young man rose from seat and rummaged through his jean pockets:
"Thank you Mary. I don't seem to have my wallet or any money. I want to give you something for your time and trouble."
Mary answered quickly, "Remember my young friend. No money is needed here. You say you owe me something?"
"Yeah. "
"Then pay your debt by being brave, believe absolutely in yourself. You have been deliberately chosen to be here. Remember, a true artist is bathe in undiluted light of the divine and is one who always finds his way in the dark, while those with little drama stumble aimlessly in the spotlight. That is the only way in which I can be paid in full," Mary said.
"For someone who is so capable of creating monsters in literature you have a way of bringing out the best in someone. I walked in your room as a brute and have been transformed into a gentleman. I will not fail you. " The young man paused and tilted his head:
"You know Mary, if I didn't know better I'd think you enjoy having the first room and it's not by chance. That those two beat poets, they never man the gate. It is you who greets new arrivals."
"Mary smiled and roes from chair, looked into the young mans eyes as she spoke:
"You have a keen mind my boy. You are correct once again. I do love it so. Besides, it is impossible to have anyone here, especially those two beat poets, do anything they are told."
The young man picked up his guitar and he and Mary both walked towards the door.
Mary said, "My young friend, you have an advantage over me. I do not have the pleasure of knowing your name."
"Oh yeah, sorry about that. My friends call me Johnny B," replied the young man.
"Well, Johnny B., perhaps together, we can attend Georgia's opening tonight. I will introduce you to the other residence and we will continue to partake in stimulating conversation.
"That's cool. I'd love that. What time should I come by?' replied young Johnny B.
Mary laughed and said, "I must say, sometimes your words are a bit bewildering.
But come now, you should know better than to look back to the old ways .
There is no need for time here, for we exist in the pace of dreams. Your instincts will inform you when to knock on my door."
"Wow, there's a lot to take in and get used to. Oh yeah Mary, where's my room?"
He had been so deep in thought that Johnny B noticed for the first time the incredible view from Mary's window. He pointed and stared.
" Out your window, that's unbelievable. I hope my room has the same view. Hum, it's strange I don't remember outside looking like that when I arrived.
" My dear Johnny B, you will not have my view from the window in your room. This view is formed from my concocted memory , therefore, it is my view, only in my room. You will have your own version of perfection to gaze upon, for each guest renders their own paradise.
Johnny B just shook his head in amazement.
Mary opened the door. They both looked out as Mary pointed in a direction and said:
"There, past the gallery and amphitheater. Your room is next to Vincent's. His is the one with all the easels piled in front of his door. I might add, you will do well to embrace his impulsive episodes. Over there, see where Dante and Virgil are walking amongst the young sunflowers that kiss their feet. That is your room. Alright Johnny B., farewell my young friend, until we meet again."
Mary and Johnny B hugged each other.
" See you later Mary," Johnny B said as he walked out the door with his guitar. He gently closed the door behind him.
Mary walked back to her chair at her desk and sat down to resume writing. After a few seconds Mary heard another knock at door. Mary shook her head smiling.
"Yes, who is it at my door?"
A nervous voice of a young woman replied, "I think I must be lost, please, I could use some help"
Mary stopped writing, she smiled, got up from her seat and opened the door.
Above: Charles E. J. Moulton as Elvis Presley
***
Excerpt from
"Remembrance of Things Past"
by Marcel Proust
I feel that there is much to be said for the Celtic belief that the souls of those whom we have lost are held captive in some inferior being, in an animal, in a plant, in some inanimate object, and so effectively lost to us until the day (which to many never comes) when we happen to pass by the tree or to obtain possession of the object which forms their prison. Then they start and tremble, they call us by our name, and as soon as we have recognised their voice the spell is broken. We have delivered them: they have overcome death and return to share our life.
And so it is with our own past. It is a labour in vain to attempt to recapture it: all the efforts of our intellect must prove futile. The past is hidden somewhere outside the realm, beyond the reach of intellect, in some material object (in the sensation which that material object will give us) which we do not suspect. And as for that object, it depends on chance whether we come upon it or not before we ourselves must die.
Many years had elapsed during which nothing of Combray, save what was comprised in the theatre and the drama of my going to bed there, had any existence for me, when one day in winter, as I came home, my mother, seeing that I was cold, offered me some tea, a thing I did not ordinarily take. I declined at first, and then, for no particular reason, changed my mind. She sent out for one of those short, plump little cakes called 'petites madeleines,' which look as though they had been moulded in the fluted scallop of a pilgrim's shell. And soon, mechanically, weary after a dull day with the prospect of a depressing morrow, I raised to my lips a spoonful of the tea in which I had soaked a morsel of the cake. No sooner had the warm liquid, and the crumbs with it, touched my palate, a shudder ran through my whole body, and I stopped, intent upon the extraordinary changes that were taking place. An exquisite pleasure had invaded my senses, but individual, detached, with no suggestion of its origin. And at once the vicissitudes of life had become indifferent to me, its disasters innocuous, its brevity illusory--this new sensation having had on me the effect which love has of filling me with a precious essence; or rather this essence was not in me, it was myself. I had ceased now to feel mediocre, accidental, mortal. Whence could it have come to me, this all-powerful joy? I was conscious that it was connected with the taste of tea and cake, but that it infinitely transcended those savours, could not, indeed, be of the same nature as theirs. Whence did it come? What did it signify? How could I seize upon and define it?
I drink a second mouthful, in which I find nothing more than in the first, a third, which gives me rather less than the second. It is time to stop; the potion is losing its magic. It is plain that the object of my quest, the truth, lies not in the cup but in myself. The tea has called up in me, but does not itself understand, and can only repeat indefinitely with a gradual loss of strength, the same testimony; which I, too, cannot interpret, though I hope at least to be able to call upon the tea for it again and to find it there presently, intact and at my disposal, for my final enlightenment. I put down my cup and examine my own mind. It is for it to discover the truth. But how? What an abyss of uncertainty whenever the mind feels that some part of it has strayed beyond its own borders; when it, the seeker, is at once the dark region through which it must go seeking, where all its equipment will avail it nothing. Seek? More than that: create. It is face to face with something which does not so far exist, to which it alone can give reality and substance, which it alone can bring into the light of day.
And I begin again to ask myself what it could have been, this unremembered state which brought with it no logical proof of its existence, but only the sense that it was a happy, that it was a real state in whose presence other states of consciousness melted and vanished. I decide to attempt to make it reappear. I retrace my thoughts to the moment at which I drank the first spoonful of tea. I find again the same state, illumined by no fresh light. I compel my mind to make one further effort, to follow and recapture once again the fleeting sensation. And that nothing may interrupt it in its course I shut out every obstacle, every extraneous idea, I stop my ears and inhibit all attention to the sounds which come from the next room. And then, feeling that my mind is growing fatigued without having any success to report, I compel it for a change to enjoy that distraction which I have just denied it, to think of other things, to rest and refresh itself before the supreme attempt. And then for the second time I clear an empty space in front of it. I place in position before my mind's eye the still recent taste of that first mouthful, and I feel something start within me, something that leaves its resting-place and attempts to rise, something that has been embedded like an anchor at a great depth; I do not know yet what it is, but I can feel it mounting slowly; I can measure the resistance, I can hear the echo of great spaces traversed.
Undoubtedly what is thus palpitating in the depths of my being must be the image, the visual memory which, being linked to that taste, has tried to follow it into my conscious mind. But its struggles are too far off, too much confused; scarcely can I perceive the colourless reflection in which are blended the uncapturable whirling medley of radiant hues, and I cannot distinguish its form, cannot invite it, as the one possible interpreter, to translate to me the evidence of its contemporary, its inseparable paramour, the taste of cake soaked in tea; cannot ask it to inform me what special circumstance is in question, of what period in my past life.
Will it ultimately reach the clear surface of my consciousness, this memory, this old, dead moment which the magnetism of an identical moment has travelled so far to importune, to disturb, to raise up out of the very depths of my being? I cannot tell. Now that I feel nothing, it has stopped, has perhaps gone down again into its darkness, from which who can say whether it will ever rise? Ten times over I must essay the task, must lean down over the abyss. And each time the natural laziness which deters us from every difficult enterprise, every work of importance, has urged me to leave the thing alone, to drink my tea and to think merely of the worries of to-day and of my hopes for to-morrow, which let themselves be pondered over without effort or distress of mind.
And suddenly the memory returns. The taste was that of the little crumb of madeleine which on Sunday mornings at Combray (because on those mornings I did not go out before church-time), when I went to say good day to her in her bedroom, my aunt Léonie used to give me, dipping it first in her own cup of real or of lime-flower tea. The sight of the little madeleine had recalled nothing to my mind before I tasted it; perhaps because I had so often seen such things in the interval, without tasting them, on the trays in pastry-cooks' windows, that their image had dissociated itself from those Combray days to take its place among others more recent; perhaps because of those memories, so long abandoned and put out of mind, nothing now survived, everything was scattered; the forms of things, including that of the little scallop-shell of pastry, so richly sensual under its severe, religious folds, were either obliterated or had been so long dormant as to have lost the power of expansion which would have allowed them to resume their place in my consciousness. But when from a long-distant past nothing subsists, after the people are dead, after the things are broken and scattered, still, alone, more fragile, but with more vitality, more unsubstantial, more persistent, more faithful, the smell and taste of things remain poised a long time, like souls, ready to remind us, waiting and hoping for their moment, amid the ruins of all the rest; and bear unfaltering, in the tiny and almost impalpable drop of their essence, the vast structure of recollection.
And once I had recognized the taste of the crumb of madeleine soaked in her decoction of lime-flowers which my aunt used to give me (although I did not yet know and must long postpone the discovery of why this memory made me so happy) immediately the old grey house upon the street, where her room was, rose up like the scenery of a theatre to attach itself to the little pavilion, opening on to the garden, which had been built out behind it for my parents (the isolated panel which until that moment had been all that I could see); and with the house the town, from morning to night and in all weathers, the Square where I was sent before luncheon, the streets along which I used to run errands, the country roads we took when it was fine. And just as the Japanese amuse themselves by filling a porcelain bowl with water and steeping in it little crumbs of paper which until then are without character or form, but, the moment they become wet, stretch themselves and bend, take on colour and distinctive shape, become flowers or houses or people, permanent and recognisable, so in that moment all the flowers in our garden and in M. Swann's park, and the water-lilies on the Vivonne and the good folk of the village and their little dwellings and the parish church and the whole of Combray and of its surroundings, taking their proper shapes and growing solid, sprang into being, town and gardens alike, all from my cup of tea.
Afterglow
by
Gerald Arthur Winter
He was startled by the knock at the front door. Then the doorknob jiggled for a moment
before he heard the key inserted and the deadbolt click open. The metal door creaked on its
hinges as it swung open. The bright, rectangular light from the open door hurt his eyes from
twenty feet across the hardwood floor to the sofa where he’d been anticipating . . . anticipating
. . . anticipating . . . something—anything to help him regain what he’d lost.
A backlit figure, obviously of a woman with her graceful, dance-like strides, came
toward him. With the setting sun at her back, her lithe figure cast a long shadow, a narrow black
path that cut straight to his doubts. She turned to close the door behind her, but he objected.
“No! Leave it open . . . I need fresh air.”
“Fresh air?” she questioned with a thin taint of mockery in her tone. “I think you may
have had too much of that already,”
“How so?”
“I’ve been calling you for the past—” She looked at her pink smart phone’s screen.
“Jesus, Jared. It’s been eighteen hours.”
He frowned then gave her a blank stare. The time hadn’t registered.
She sat beside him and put her cool palm to his fevered forehead.
“Are you ill?” she asked. “Should I take you to your doctor?”
“It’s Sunday, Bethany.”
“Then to the ER.”
“No . . . I just need rest . . . to gather my thoughts.”
“Thoughts about what? About us?”
“Everything doesn’t have to be about us.”
“Maybe not, Jared, but lately it seems everything has nothing to do with us.”
He grimaced and shook his head. “I just needed time to complete my novel. I’d promised
delivery of my final draft by . . . shit! By tomorrow.”
“That’s why I’ve been calling. This three month separation has been hard on me . . .
I’ve missed you, Jared.”
Without response, he just stared blankly at her.
“Damn you! Kiss me,” she implored with a puckered close-eyed lean toward him.
“Mmh,” he responded in her embrace, as her lips searched for his tongue, like an
anaconda unhinging its jaws to swallow a capybara along the Amazon, but he resisted.
“Jared! What’s with you? Is there someone else? You slept with her last night and
now you’re done with me?”
“You’re being ridiculous, Bethany. I’ll never be done with you, but . . . I may be done
with me.”
“What are you talking about, Baby?” she asked nuzzling his neck, but before he could
answer, she pulled back with a start. “Jared! What happened to your shoulder? My God!”
She pulled his bathrobe off his shoulder bruised deep purple. As she kept pulling
the bathrobe lower, she saw that his entire arm was the same lavender hematoma hue.
“I’d better get you to the ER right now,” she said.
“No ER . . . I’ll be fine. It doesn’t hurt. I saw it when I took a shower. It goes down
my back on the left side and—” he pulled open his bathrobe to reveal his total nakedness, no
surprises there after three years as lovers. “My left hip and down my thigh past my knee to my
lower calf.” He raised his left leg and rotated his foot. “The ankle’s fine.”
“How can it not hurt?” she asked. “It looks dreadfully painful. It hurts just to look at it.”
“Because compared to my inner hurt, these exterior bruises are insignificant.”
“Don’t go literary on me at this crucial moment. This looks fucking serious! Do you think
anything’s broken?”
He grinned at the corner of his mouth, creasing a dimple that had first attracted her to
him. “Not any bones,” he sighed. “Just my spirit.”
“Okay. Let’s start from the beginning,” she said as if she were prepared to take dictation.
She occasionally had when the only way he could create a short story was verbally because his
fingers couldn’t keep pace with his mental narrative.
Jared struck a pose in Lord Olivier, Shakespearian fashion, “It was a dark and stormy
night as Jared emerged from his mother’s womb.”
She punched his right shoulder. “Damn you, Jared! I’m serious!”
He pulled the robe off his right shoulder. “I’ll give it an hour, but you may have hit me
hard enough to have matching purple shoulders. Jeez. Where’d you learn to punch like that?”
“I grew up in Philly. My best defense against the mean girls.”
“Well just control yourself. I had a pampered childhood.”
“Yeah, right. Ozone Park, Queens? That couldn’t have been a church social either.”
“Guilty as charged,” he huffed, but slipped back into the dregs of his morose.
“What have you been doing these past eighteen hours to have ended up such a fucking
mess?”
“Blank . . .”
“What do you mean?”
“A total blank.”
“You mean you don’t remember?”
“Not a damn thing—zero.”
“Wow! Okay. Go back in your mind to the last thing you can remember.”
“I’d been working eight or more hours a day since the end of June till—what day is it?”
He’d already had his wall calendar out on the coffee table before Bethany arrived, so
he leaned forward from the sofa and pointed to the day Bethany had said it was.
“It’s Sunday. We just talked about that. Remember, your doctor’s office is closed today.”
He nodded and pointed. “Hmm, today is Sunday, June twenty-fourth. Yesterday, I had
the last scene in my novel to write, only a couple of pages left to go. I used Hemingway’s advice
by not writing the last scene, even though I’d already worked it out in my mind. Papa said it was
best to stop writing near the peak of a climax and sleep on it so all the creative juices could
percolate overnight. It’s supposed to give a writer greater insight to write what had been con-
cluded in the subconscious, a much purer environment for creating effective fiction.”
“You mean that Dr. Butler Dreamscape shit?”
“Precisely. Intending to sleep on it, I’d been living like a monk these past ninety days to
meet my publisher’s deadline tomorrow, so I’d gone to a clean well-lighted place for cocktails
and dinner before coming home to sleep on it. The plan was to wake early this morning to
complete the novel and submit it tomorrow for my agent to deliver.”
“And so?”
“So I don’t remember leaving Adaggio’s where I had two glasses of Merlot with my
veal chops marinara.”
“How could you not remember leaving?”
“That’s the million-dollar question.”
“We should go to Adaggio’s and inquire.”
“I called an hour ago. Spoke directly to Anton, the owner. He said I seemed fine when
I left with the woman?”
“Woman? What woman?”
“I went alone. I ate alone. I don’t remember leaving, with or without a woman.”
“Anton couldn’t tell you anything about her? How about a description?”
“He’d never seen her before, but she was blond, wore sunglasses as I did, because I was
seated on the exterior balcony facing the sunset, much like tonight’s. It was about twenty-four
hours ago when I was finishing my dinner.”
“Did you finish, then have dessert or coffee?”
“I don’t think so . . . I remember looking down at my empty plate expecting the waiter to
clear the table, but then—”
“Then what?”
“There was a crashing sound, I felt jolted, then I . . . then I . . .jeez, I can’t remember,
not a thing till less than an hour ago. It’s all a blank.”
“Jesus.”
“Jesus, Mary, and Joseph—a fucking blank. I’ve been trying to write those last few pages
of my novel and none of it makes any sense. Each time I think I’m done, I realize the last three
pages are the same—the same! Over and over, the same goddamn pages, paragraphs, sentences,
and words. It’s as if I’m not writing them, but they’re writing themselves . . . They have a life
of their own.”
“Show me,” she said.
As she read the pages, Jared stared at the widescreen TV left on mute. It was the local
news. A boy had been run over and left for dead in a hit-and-run incident with no witnesses. It
happened in an rural section of town where there were no security cameras to view a video of
the apparent vehicular homicide.
Bethany read aloud: “He felt like an angel, his feet not touching the ground as he
descended the balcony stairs to the parking lot. In his mind, he seemed to float across the
parking lot to his car. It looked like a good chance of rain with dark clouds hovering on
the horizon above the sun setting atop the distant trees. He opened the hatchback of his
SUV and took out a cheap umbrella, the kind sold for three bucks on city street corners
in a sudden downpour, but not meant to survive more than a single squall. Much as he felt
about himself regarding his longevity in the nameless shit storm that his writing career had
recently become—”
He interrupted her narrative from the manuscript on his laptop. “Stop. Please, quick
run downstairs to the garage and bring me my umbrella.”
“What the hell for?” she balked.
“Uh, I want to see if it’s wet from using it in the rain last night. It might help my
memory.”
“You’ve been lying around till almost dinner time, Jared. Can’t you get it yourself?”
He lowered the shoulder of his robe to reveal the purple bruise and fawned for sympathy.
“Christ, you’re such a baby.”
He opened his robe like a flasher. “That’s no baby—Baby.”
She huffed, “I liked you better when you had no memory of what an asshole you can be.”
“Sorry. You’ve been so kind in my hour—make that eighteen hours—of need.”
“You sound like John Barrymore in an old Thirties flick that I wish had remained silent.
Okay. I’ll get the umbrella, but I think I should take you to the ER for a look at those wounds
—and to check for a concussion, too. Which may explain your memory loss.”
When she closed the door where she’d entered minutes ago, he waited until he heard
her footsteps descending on the exterior wooden stairs from the balcony to the garage. Then
he turned up the TV’s volume and heard: “The police have been going door to door in the
neighborhood surrounding the alleged scene of the hit-and-run. The boy was pronounced
dead at the scene when found at eight o’clock this morning by another boy on a bicycle. The
coroner put the time of death no later than nine o’clock last night. Apparently the body had
been left alongside the light-trafficked country road for about twelve hours before discovered.
If you know anything, anything at all, please call the hotline shown on your TV screen. The
boy’s parents have been distraught since he hadn’t return home last night from his job at
McDonald’s. He was expected by 10 p.m. but never showed.”
Jared heard Bethany shriek from the garage. He turned off the TV and heard her
rapid ascent on the stairs. The door swung open just as before, still startling him even though
this time he was anticipating her entry.
“What?” he asked her as she approached him.
“When did you have an accident with your car?” she asked.
“Accident?”
“Your left front fender is totally crunched.”
“Oh . . . when you said ‘accident’ I thought you meant with another car. I hit a deer a
week ago. Poor thing never had a chance. I was going to report it, but with my novel’s deadline,
you know how it is.”
“Where did this happen?” she asked.
“Hmm, let’s see. It was when I took a short cut off Ulmerton Rd. That country road that
winds around the horse farms and saves you fifteen minutes with no traffic lights. You know
how bad the traffic can be on a weekend.”
“Weekend?” she asked. “Which weekend? Not last night?”
“Last night?” he hesitated staring into space for a moment. “Oh, no. It happened the
weekend before.” He began repeating himself in Trumpian fashion, hammering details into the
solid metal of the listener’s brain until his truth became hers by amalgamation. “I’d just bought
a book I’d wanted to read for a long time. I went to Barnes and Noble in town, got the book
on discount with my membership then drove home.”
He reached for his wallet lying on the coffee table beside the calendar. From between
the loose bills, mostly twenties, he pulled out a receipt from the book purchase. He unfolded it
and squinted at it closely then handed it to her as if it were a Special Delivery of fact: Exhibit A.
She squinted at the receipt as well and said, “Mmh. September sixteenth. Then the car is
drivable, right? Since you hit the deer?”
“Well . . . I drove it home that night but . . . I guess I haven’t tried to drive it since.”
“Why not?” she asked.
“I figured I’d just call and have it towed by the body shop when I was ready to make the
insurance claim.”
“Don’t you have to make a claim within limited time, like twenty-four hours, maybe
forty-eight at most?
“The novel . . . the deadline . . . it’s consumed me,” he rationalized. “The dent isn’t
important compared to that . . . it’s my living. The dent is nothing but an unfortunate reminder
of an animal that didn’t have the good sense to look before it leaped.”
She said, “You’re forgetting one important fact, Jared.”
His mind raced. Fact? Fact? Forgot a fact. Forgot a fucking fact?
She took a deep breath then spoke in high C, like air slowly released from a balloon.
“You must have driven your car to and from Adaggio’s last night when you had dinner . . .
with that damn mystery woman.”
“The blonde?”
“The same . . . with the sunglasses . . . who Anton never saw before.”
“It’s coming back to me now . . .” he said as if visualizing a scene.
“Oh, really?”
“Yes.”
“Who is she, Jared?”
“My Uber driver.”
“You can’t expect me to—”
“No. Really, Bethany. Her name was Lilly.”
“Like short for Lillian?
“No . . . no. She was very unusual. She introduced herself to me, as Lilly when she
picked me up here to go to Adaggio’s last night at six. But her name on her posted ID said
“Lilith.”
“Oh, boy! That’s a good one, Jared. So some psycho Uber driver with satanic genes
beat the crap out of you and gave you all these bruises. Maybe you didn’t tip her enough
after she drove you home, so she threw your ass down that twenty-foot flight of stairs from
your balcony to your garage?”
“It’s a thought,” he said with a shrug, but she wasn’t buying it.
Obviously pissed, she waved an arm at him with dismissal and said, “Have it your way,
Jared. But I’m going to call Uber and find out who this psycho bitch is who threw you down
the stairs. Not like I haven’t wanted to do the same to you often enough.”
As he heard her footsteps in decent on the exterior stairs, each clunk on the wooden steps
reminded him of his drunken tumble down the stairs last night. Was it 9:45 p.m. or 10:15 p.m?
The numbers had been blurred on his SUV’s digital clock right after the impact, enough from
the side along the dark road’s shoulder to collapse his fender, but not enough to inflate the
airbag. He swore he’d seen a deer, an eight-point buck writhing with muscles in his rearview
mirror. Nothing else, so he’d kept driving with only a mile left to get to his home.
He’d fumbled with the remote garage opener but entered without a scratch. He’d gotten
out of his car, beeped the car lock with his keys, then closed the door and headed up the stairs to
have that last night’s sleep for the closing scene of his novel to congeal the action in his grey
matter.
He undressed and put on his robe and sat on the sofa, gathering his thoughts as he flipped
on the eleven o’clock news. As he’d drifted off in slumber, he felt at peace with himself, a
smooth transcendence from what is and what might be.
He felt like an angel, his feet not touching the ground as he descended the balcony stairs
to the parking lot. In his mind, he seemed to float across the parking lot to his car. It looked like
a good chance of rain with dark clouds hovering on the horizon above the sun setting atop the
distant trees. He opened the hatchback of his SUV and took out a cheap umbrella, the kind sold
for three bucks on city street corners in a sudden downpour, and not meant to survive more than
a single squall. Much as he felt about himself regarding his longevity in the nameless shit storm
that his writing career had recently become. He was feeling lightheaded from his two glasses of
wine at dinner. Anton knew his car, so it wouldn’t be towed if he left it overnight and took a cab
home. He dialed Uber.
Within two minutes, the Uber driver showed up, lowered her window and said, “Hi,
Mr. Smythe, I’m your ride.”
When he sat in the passenger seat beside her, he read her ID card on the dash and made a
muffled hmm sound.
“Problem?” the driver asked.
“Oh, no,” he said with a shrug.
“What then?” she asked.
“I used to date a woman with the same name.”
“No shit.”
“Yes, shit,” he said, grinning. That dimple crease in his cheek held her attention.
“You’re my last fare tonight,” she said. “I started at 6 a.m.”
“Whew! Sixteen hours? Is that legal?”
“No . . . but I am.”
There was a minute of silence. Ten minutes from Adaggio’s she was already pulling into
his driveway.
Nice to meet you, Mr. Smythe,” she said. “Here’s my card. I’m local so you can always
call me direct when you’re in a hurry.”
“You want to come up?” he nodded to the stairs leading to his second-floor balcony.
“You mean for a drink?” she asked, totally blasé and not offended by such an open, male
predatory gesture.
“Or for the night . . . but only if you want to,” he said, showing all his cards.
“Didn’t I see you with a woman in the parking lot just before I arrived to pick you up?”
she asked.
“The blonde?”
“The blonde.”
“Business associate,” he said.
“What’s your business?”
“I’m a writer?”
“What do you write?” she asked.
“The jury’s still out on that.”
“Can I be your jury-of-one tonight?”
“Why not? Come on in, Bethany.”
She followed him up the stairs and they entered his condo. She went to the bathroom
to freshen up and he did the same. In his robe he came to the living room and poured two glasses
of Merlot then waited for her to join him. He was startled by the knock at the front door. Then
the doorknob jiggled for a moment before he heard the key inserted and the deadbolt click open.
The metal door creaked on its hinges as it swung open. The bright, rectangular light from the
open door hurt his eyes from twenty feet across the hardwood floor to the sofa where he’d been
anticipating . . . anticipating . . . anticipating . . . something—anything to help him regain what
he’d lost.
A backlit figure, obviously of a woman with her graceful, dance-like strides, came
toward him. With the setting sun at her back, her lithe figure cast a long shadow, a narrow black
path that cut straight to his doubts. She turned to the open door behind her, where two other
figures followed her.
“Jared Smythe?” one of the men asked.
“Yes,” he said with resigned calm as the blonde took off her sunglasses.
“Sorry, Jared,” she said. “They’ve seen your car in the garage. The dented fender.
There’s blood. It’s a match.”
“Bethany!” He called to the bathroom. “Come out and tell these people where I’ve been
these past eighteen hours.”
He thought he still heard the shower running, but it turned out like most of the past
eighteen hours, that it was all just the afterglow of his imagination . . . music of the night that
spun a tune to suit its composer, but echoed untruths, perhaps lies, even to himself.
Give me your teeth!
By Amirah Al Wassif
Once upon a time, in a very far land called Orshalim,
three innocent boys sat at the under an immense fig tree.
The three cheerful boys, Ali, Peter, and Abraham, played with their poor toys non stop, their playthings very old and dirty,
trying all the time to imagine their toys clean and new.
This way, they felt better and continued playing with joy.
One night, the three boys gathered around a mysterious massive thing.
The strange thing started moving from side to side, surrounded from alley to alley.
Ali, Peter, and Abraham looked at the moving thing deeply, watching how this weird thing danced and jumped without rest.
When this big moving thing shook all the trees around them, the friendly boys approached it a bit too close this time, all of them saw the real thing:
it was a flying plate, full of the most splendid and delicious kinds of desserts.
The boys were taken by the extraordinary behavior of this flying plate, they watched it closely, then the marvelous desserts which were found in the plate rolled and performed a crazy dance, each piece of this wonderful candy went out from the plate, landed suddenly and jumped on the three boy's toes.
Ali, Peter, and Abraham became very frightened and astonished, so, they stopped for a long time, looked and looked again,
they waited all night, and did not go home.
Now this long night spent, and the boys still sitting down next to the magnificent plate, but when the sun arrived at its position in the sky,
the flying plate which full of desserts had been disappeared.
"Oh! Where is the plate?" Ali cried in fear.
"I cannot believe my eyes," Peter whispered to himself, and Abraham said in a loud tone, "it's like a dream."
The three boys were talking and talking, not sure if they saw a true flying plate with wonderful candy which could dance and jump to all sides.
Ali, Peter, and Abraham went back to their home, the three kind boys all neighbors.
They reached to their country Orshalim and gathered together in the common yard, then they kissed and hugged each other,
and all of them said "goodbye" in peaceful manner.
But the kind boys did not know the harsh manner that awaited them in their houses.
When the boys knocked their doors simultaneously, their mothers opened quickly, and each boy entered his house, and each door closed.
After that, the three mothers asked their boys the reason for their delay on this night.
Their mothers would punish them if they would not respond, so the boys told them about the wonderful flying plate, and they talked for a long hour describing its desserts, its crazy dance, but their mothers did not believe them, and all of them decided to punish the three boys.
The punishment was very, very hard for the boys, because it prevented them from playing, and going to any place together again.
Ali, Peter, and Abraham were very angry and felt bad.
They used to go to the wide garden every night where the wonder flying plate was,
Their mothers did not believe what they said and discarded this story as a lie.
So, the three boys were punished for many days, and they did not go anywhere.
Peter pondered those long days about a magical solution to their problem.
He asked himself, each day more and more how could they prove the flying plate as a truth for their mothers?
Finally, Peter's good idea popped into his soul like a light, a light, a candle that might help them.
Peter decided to go to Ali and Abraham homes, as he wanted to tell them about his new plan.
Peter went to Abrahams house, knocked softly on the glass window, hoping Abraham's mother would not see him.
Now, Abraham sensed the new plan, decided to go to Ali's house and tell him, as well.
Only minutes later, the boys were on their way to the garden where the flying plate sat at the center of the massive fig tree.
The boys arrived at the tree, watching the splendid plate, delighted because of its charm, but suddenly Peter remembered their new
plan. The flying plate! The truth! Their mothers!
Peter said to Ali and Abraham, quickly in vast agitation:
"Carry me, carry me, we shall get this plate, we shall hold it and show it wonder ability for our mothers to believe us, and would not punish us again."
Ali and Abraham were very excited, and did so.
Peter had been carried by his fellows, he tried to touch the plate which found in the center of the fig tree, but when he closed to it the plate disappeared.
Peter repeated, trying many times to catch the plate, but every time, the plate seemed to be hidden from the boy's eyes.
They did not know the logical reason of what happened, however, but could not stop trying.
This night spent, the boys had failed in catching the wonder plate. They were tired.
Suddenly, all of them down, Peter's leg broken, Ali's trouser torn.
Only Abraham was well.
For that reason, he helped his friends go home rapidly.
As the first time, mothers of the boys punished them, but this time the matter was worse because all the people in Orshalim repeated that Ali, Peter, and Abraham are liars, and because of their lies God punished them by breaking Peter's leg and tearing Ali trousers.
"God punished Abraham too, cause he made him a foolish boy, a boy who believes his friends lies,
and as a result of his foolish behavior, everybody in Orshalim made fun of him."
Many days spent, and everyone in Orshalim repeated these words daily:
Ali, Peter, and Abraham are fools and liars.
Peter and Ali were locked in their houses, their mothers treated them hardly, and all people laugh at them.
One day, Abraham woke early, thought of his friends,
he wanted to prove the truth of the flying plate to all, and the only question which surrounded in his mind
"How?"
After hours of thinking, Abraham decided to go to the wide and amazing garden, all alone,
because of the hard conditions of his friends, and so, he went straight to the place of the wonder plate.
When the dusk covered the sky, Abraham approached to the center of the fig tree.
At that time, the flying plate danced up and down.
Abraham watches the plate's performance. Suddenly, he tried to catch it, but as with Peter, the plate disappeared.
Abraham never gave up, he tried and tried and tried, by the way, he fell down many times, his leg broken, his clothes torn,
but he decided to never go home without the evidence for innocent of his friends.
Abraham spent three nights trying to catch the flying plate with no stop or rest,
and finally, he cried, his tears, covered his awesome face, but he did not give up.
Now, something very strange happened.
When Abraham caught the plate, a piece of paper fell down from the fig tree!
Abraham was thirsting to read the paper, he closed to it, and had read the paper with wide eyes and mouth,
something was written in it, something very weird, a single sentence:
"Give me your teeth!"
Abraham's arms shook with fear, he did not understand what the strange paper meant, so he wrote on the back of the same paper: how?
The flying plate sent another piece of paper to Abraham, then he picked it up and read these words:
"When you give me your teeth, I will reveal myself to you, and everybody."
Abraham feared this more and more, but decided to never go home without this evidence for his best friends Ali and Peter,
so he wrote on the back of the paper:
"How many teeth"?
Then, the plate replied:
"One tooth equals one piece."
Now, Abraham understood the game, so he started giving the plate as many teeth which he owned,
wanting to catch all the wonderful pieces of desserts, and made it shown to all his people.
After a week spent, Abraham went back to his home Orshalim, all the people gathered around him, even the mothers and his friends Ali and Peter,
All these folks were waiting for the wondrous flying plate.
Abraham had shown it to everyone, all the people watching with stare eyes.
Everyone believed the three boys, after that.
The people in this country wrote a proverb on the wall honoring Abraham courage in wonderful friendship between him and Ali and Peter:
"Courage is as rare as the flying plate of desserts, as singular as the numbers of teeth that Abraham could keep!"
The Candle in the Wind
a novel excerpt from
THE BLIND SPOT
by
Gerald Arthur Winter
“Each day of our lives we make deposits
in the memory banks of our children.”
— Charles R. Swindol
My grandparents adorned their patio with a bright yellow table cloth on the
picnic table with pink paper napkins and helium balloons. It all read, “Happy Birthday,
Bonnie,” but I was impatient for Jack to arrive, worried whether he even would.
Gram baked a seven-layer cake with pink icing and stuck a turquoise number
seven on top. A stack of gift-wrapped presents on the picnic table were all marked: “Our
Birthday Girl, Bonnie.” Gram and Gramps had bought my first bicycle, hoping Jack
would make time to teach me how to ride it without its training wheels. Draped with
ribbons and bows, the bike was surrounded by a pyramid of wrapped gifts.
I listened for Jack’s pickup truck in the driveway as guests arrived. A dozen of
my third-grade classmates were already seated, five girls and seven boys. The girls had
come because their parents knew Gram and Gramps from church and they knew me
from Sunday school. The boys had come begrudgingly, only because I’d beaten them
all at arm wrestling left-handed and right-handed. The boys’ attendance was the cost
of their lost wagers that even one of them could beat me.
Dressed in a crinkly pink party dress that scratched my legs and made me feel
silly in front of the boys, I stood on my tippy-toes on the picnic table’s bench to peek
over the hedges each time I heard a car coming up the street. The knot tied with a pink
ribbon on top of my head felt tight and uncomfortable. Though I heard the boys’
murmurings about pulling the knot loose to make my long blond hair fall in my face,
one squint from me warned them they’d get punched in the eye.
Our guests were getting impatient for a piece of cake, but I insisted they’d have
to wait until my pop, Jack, arrived. Reluctantly, Gram complied, but with a shake of her
head as if to say—good luck with that. Jack’s a no-show for your party.
A pair of hands suddenly wrapped around my waist from behind, but it was only
Gramps, not my pop.
“Don’t want you falling down on your birthday,” he said with a whisper in my
ear. “Jack will be here soon. I’m sure of it.”
Gram, who’d come out to set the table for the children, scowled and mumbled
something under her breath. She’d never had a son. The misbehaving boys poking at one
another and making faces at the girls was an element of the party Gram obviously hadn’t
counted on. Jack’s tardiness was business as usual, but Gram’s spirits perked when some
friends of hers and Gramps’ began to fill the yard. The moms wore pastel summer outfits
and wide-brimmed sun bonnets.
I was about to give up on Pop when his old pickup wheeled into the driveway.
I saw him behind the wheel, raking his fingers through his unkempt hair. He turned the
rearview mirror to check his face then rubbed his eyes. He paused a while before getting
out of the truck, probably already regretting his attendance. I took a deep breath of relief
when he got out of his truck. I felt stirred by his presence, knowing I somehow belonged
to him.
Jack came empty-handed, but his presence was gift enough for me. He pecked
Gram’s cheek, fumbled in his pocket, then I saw him tuck a crisp hundred dollar bill into
Gram’s apron pouch. Gram frowned when she saw what it was. Jack shrugged it off and
shook Gramps’ hand. I could tell it was a strong grip from both, as if they were wrestling
each other over some issue—probably me—I was always an issue for Jack. I wasn’t sure
why. Grownups and their issues were a mystery back then, sometimes even now at eighteen.
Jack could sniff out a cold beer from across the yard. I’m sure I’d heard Gramps
say that, more than once, but when Jack wasn’t around. Jack grabbed a beer from a cooler
beside the picnic table and popped the top off a bottle of Bud. He raised it to Gramps
with cheers and met Gram’s frown with his subtly spiteful smirk.
Finally, he turned to me. “Happy Birthday, squirt,” he said, staring blankly as if
at nothing. I didn’t care if he called me squirt, as long as he spoke to me. He closed his
bloodshot eyes and downed the beer in a few seconds then turned back to the cooler.
I noticed that Jack was even more sullen than usual. Regardless, I preferred less
coddling from my grandparents and more time with Pop. I was drawn to him, though he
practically ignored me. I’d heard Gram tell Gramps that Jack’s weekend “binges” at the
Seaside boardwalk had to stop if they ever hoped to leave me at his home more than once
or twice a month. I’d have been grateful even for that little time with Jack.
Though I didn’t know what a “binge” was, I was pretty sure it had to do with all
the empty beer cans overflowing the kitchen waste can at Jack’s house. I’d seen them
the few times I’d visited. That was an agreement to which Jack had first adamantly
refused. He’d finally reconsidered, but with reluctance and obvious regret as revealed
by his surly expressions.
I’d overheard Jack saying to Gramps, “I’m feeling buyer’s remorse with this
arrangement.”
I’d sensed from his tone that “buyer’s remorse” was Jack’s fancy way of saying
he didn’t want me living with him.
In my mind, I’d thought of Jack affectionately as Pop, though I hadn’t mustered
the courage to call him that to his face. I hoped my birthday party might give me that
opportunity. I kept my lips taut, but was waiting for the right moment to call him Pop,
just to get his reaction.
“Come on, Jack,” Gramps said, nudging him. “Let’s take a photo of you with
Bonnie blowing out the candles. It’s a big day for our little girl.”
The hungry children at the picnic table gave a cheer, knowing a slice of cake
would soon be on their plates. A deep gash creased between Jack’s eyes. I studied his
flushed face. Gramps lit the seven candles and all the guests gathered around. Jack
clenched his jaw. I touched Jack’s bulging forearm, making him flinch, pulling away
from me. A wave of grief passed through me like a ghost.
I turned toward Jack’s glassy-eyed stare and conceded with a shrug that he
would be no help to me blowing out the candles.
“Let’s go, Jack!” Gramps said. “I bet she can’t blow out all those candles by
herself.”
“Can, too!” I said.
“We’ll all help you blow out the candles,” Gram said. “Won’t we, Jack?”
“I can blow them out myself,” I said. “I don’t need anyone’s help! Not yours or
Pop’s!”
It was out of my mouth, but the word hovered with anger rather than affection.
Jack paid no attention to what I’d said, but rather the harsh tone I’d used to say it.
“Speak respectfully to your grandparents!” Jack said. “Don’t give me reason to
spank you!”
The boys at the table grinned at the prospect of my getting my due, but the girls
and other parents frowned.
Gramps stepped between us and said, “She meant no disrespect, Jack. She’s just
very sure of herself.”
Gram glared at Jack. “If you spent more time with her, you’d know that.”
“How come you’re so angry on my birthday?” I asked him.
My grandparents eyed each. The guests exchanged wary glances.
Jack stalled with a long breath. “I don’t want to talk about it.” He walked away
from the table.
Gramps followed after him. “You can tell us,” he said, but Gram shook her head
with dismissal. I remember their exchange as if it were yesterday.
“Forget about it,” Jack said, realizing the guest were staring across the yard at him
from the table.
“Maybe I can help,” Gramps said.
Jack looked at his hands. “Got fired,” he said aside so none of the guests would
hear.but I did. “No teaching or coaching. They’ve banned me from all of it.”
“But you have tenure.”
Jack shrugged and sipped his beer. “Budget cuts . . . they hired a new baseball
coach out of college at half my salary.”
Gram went over to them and said in a whisper, “It’s your drinking.”
A cloud came across Jack’s face. But before he could snap at Gram, Gramps said,
“Some Board members are my friends from the Elks. Maybe I could pull some strings.”
Jack shook his head and sneered.
Gramps said, “Enough bad news for today. Come on, Jack, I’ll take a photo of
you and Bonnie blowing out her candles together.”
Jack shrugged with slumped shoulders, but followed Gramps back to the table.
“How come, Uncle Davey didn’t come to my party?” I asked Jack.
“Did you even tell her Uncle Davey that she was having a birthday party?” Gram
asked, though she seemed to already know the answer.
With his red eyes, Jack shot daggers at Gram. “Too far to travel,” he said.
“Too bad,” Gram said. “If Lydia hadn’t told me she’d met him—I’d think your
brother didn’t exist. But at least we’re all here for Bonnie’s special day.”
Jack winced. I knew it was because my mother had died on this day. She’d died
giving birth to me and everything had been a mess since. Her death had broken Jack’s
heart. There had been no way to comfort him. I’d heard Gram tell her church friends that
Jack, without my mother, had become a lost soul, and that was his excuse for drinking.
Gramps put an arm around Jack’s shoulder and whispered in his ear. Jack nodded.
Gramps always knew the right thing to say to keep the peace.
Finally, Jack agreed to pose for the photo, but with a forced smile, asking me,
“You don’t really believe you can blow out all seven candles by yourself, do you, squirt?
I bet you can’t.”
The girls at the picnic table encouraged me to try, but the boys frowned and shook
their heads, knowing from their own experience that betting against me would always be
a mistake. Their forced attendance at my party was proof enough.
Jack challenged his students in class and varsity players on the baseball field,
but he’d never challenged me at anything. He’d always acted as if giving me that much
attention would be a waste of his time. I figured with the selfish, naïve logic of a child
that his job loss would give him plenty of extra time to spend with me.
My anger welled. “Can too!” I shouted. “But no cheating. Cover your mouth with
your hand so I’m sure you’re not helping.” I felt compelled to bargain. “What will you
give me if I blow out all seven candles with one breath?”
“Give you?” He shrugged with a smirk. “It’s your wish . . . whatever you want.”
Then he said so no one else would hear, “Only if I can afford it on unemployment.”
“I just want to play catch with you, Pop,”
Looking as if the air had been sucked out of him, Jack said, “I don’t have a
baseball mitt, not at home—they’re too expensive and—”
“Sure you do,” I said, “It’s in the attic.”
Jack’s expression looked as if he’d been struck a blow, no doubt wondering how
I could know about the baseball mitt he’d kept hidden for years.
I enjoyed seeing the shock on Jack’s face, recalling how I’d first learned about his
dark secret . . .
Jack was stumbling up the staircase with heavy steps across the warped landing
outside my bedroom. The century-old house was a fixer-upper Jack had never fixed. It
was my house, too, but before that first night, I’d lived with my grandparents ever since
I could remember. Jack’s elbows bumped along the walls in the hallway when he came
to my door. His footsteps paused for a moment then continued up to the third floor.
I’d wandered up to the third floor only once before on a daytime visit months
ago, but Jack had scolded me, warning: “Don’t ever go up there again!”
Wondering what Jack was up to, I peeked up the staircase from my open door.
Jack was swaying on the third-floor landing and made several failed attempts before he
grabbed the cord to open the folding attic stairs. The ceiling was water-stained above
Jack’s head, and paint chips fluttered down like snowflakes to the landing. Jack ascended
the attic stairs, each step with a squeak from its rusted springs. Though I’d heard him
complain about the leaky roof, the dripping had continued with every rain storm soaking
the carpet on the third-floor landing with a mildew stench.
I went halfway up the staircase just in time to see Jack’s feet disappearing from
the unfolded ladder into the attic. I climbed slowly to the third-floor landing, then put one
bare foot on the first rough, wooden wrung. I grabbed the narrow ladder with both hands,
but got a splinter in my thumb. I held my breath so I wouldn’t cry out and squinted to
hold back my tears. I already knew that Jack didn’t like “cry-babies.”
Over the past two years since I’d started school, I’d been able to watch Jack
coaching his high school team. Gramps would lift me onto his shoulders so I could see
the infield. I’d heard Jack shout from the dugout steps: “No cry-babies! Suck it up!”
A pitch had hit a boy’s ankle during batting practice and he’d slump to his knees
in the batter’s box. The pain had brought tears to the boy’s eyes. Jack hadn’t known I
was watching. I’d observed his gestures and the inflection of his voice. At my grand-
parents’ home, I’d often mimic Jack’s gait and body language. I’d tilt my New York
Yankees baseball cap at the same angle as his.
“Don’t let Jack catch her doing that,” Gram had warned, but Gramps had
laughed into tears at the accuracy of my mimicry. I enjoyed being a clown.
“He’d have a fit,” Gramps had agreed.
I’d noticed how the teenage boys on Jack’s team had done whatever he’d told
them to do and they’d run to him whenever he’d shout their names.
“You’re fine. Quit crying!” Jack had told the boy hit by the pitch. He’d made
the boy run laps, limping back and forth in the outfield. Jack always seemed angry. I
wondered why, because his team usually won their games. According to Gramps,
Jack’s varsity baseball teams had won three Ocean County Championships and two
New Jersey State Championships. That sounded important. Watching him coach, I
felt a growing certainty that Jack was special to others as well as to me.
“But why is he always angry, Gramps?” I’d asked.
Gramps took a deep breath, telling her, “Jack is a perfectionist, a big word for
you, but he wants his team to be the best. See how he’s rubbing that boy’s ankle after
running laps. Jack cares about the boys, but still wants them to be tough. He’s a great
baseball coach.”
“If I’m tough, will he care about me, too?”
Gramps grinned. “Jack cares about you, Bonnie. He’s hurting inside. Your Gram
is impatient with him, but Jack needs us to give him time.”
“Time for what?” I asked.
“He needs more time to heal. Even when he behaves badly, love him. He needs
you very much, but hasn’t figured that out yet.”
Watching Jack rub the boy’s ankle, I wished it had been my ankle. I envied the
boys on Jack’s team and longed for that same attention from him.
I gradually understood that I was connected to Jack, but since he’d rarely been
around, I wasn’t sure how. I hadn’t seen much of him since starting kindergarten, but the
past two years changed that on Gram’s insistence. She would occasionally drop me off at
Jack’s house unannounced, waiting till a Friday afternoon when he’d come home from
coaching baseball. He’d be tired at the end of the week and hopefully less resistant to my
unexpected presence.
“He loves surprises,” Gram told me on the drive over to Jack’s house.
Never seemed so to me by Jack’s red face and the sharp crease between his eye-
brows. I’d seen that expression when Jack had kicked dirt onto an umpire’s shoes over a
close play. Sometimes Jack’s hot temper would get him thrown out of a game, but the
only umpire to successfully stand between Jack and Gram was Gramps.
Jack would always bring me back to my grandparents’ home sooner than expected.
Disappointed, I’d run into Gram’s house, so they’d think I couldn’t hear them talking
about me. I’d open a window upstairs and listen.
Gram said to Jack, “Bonnie needs you.”
“We’ve been through this,” Jack argued. “I’ll be no good to her. I’m a successful
teacher and coach, but that’s all I’m fit to do.”
“There’s very little difference,” Gramps had said in his calm, quiet tone that
always helped me go peacefully to sleep. “The only difference is the deeper love family
provides. The boys you coach will come and go, so will your students, but Bonnie will
always be with you. She’s your blood.”
“Blood,” that’s how we were connected. Nothing should ever come between us.
Jack and Gram were often at odds, with extended silences, sometimes for weeks.
Only Gramps with his reasonable affirmations could get them talking to each other again
—until the next incident.
Recalling his gruff manner on the baseball field, I’d continued following Jack up
to the attic that night I’d spied on him.
“The glove is not an object in the usual sense . . . to divide it from
yourself, even in thought, is one of the roots of error.”
Chad Harbach – The Art of Fielding
I held my breath, slowly exhaling so Jack wouldn’t hear me. With the wind
whistling against the roof and rain dripping down the open stairwell, I climbed up the
ladder behind him. My heart pounded, weighing my curiosity against my punishment if
Jack were to catch me spying on him hours past my bedtime.
I peeked from the top attic step. Jack was kneeling with his back to me. He
lifted a blue cardboard box from the shadows of the eaves. He took a baseball mitt from
the box. The mitt wasn’t beat-up like those I’d seen on Jack’s team, but looked brand
new, giving off a fresh aroma of linseed oil in the stuffy attic. Jack put the mitt on his
right hand and pounded his left fist into its pocket, so hard it seemed as if he were
punching someone. I hoped he’d never turn his anger on me, even if he caught me
snooping on him.
Before he could catch me, I backed down the stairs. Even if he heard me, I was
too quick to be seen, scrambling, almost tripping in my escape. With my pulse pounding
in my ears, I darted into Jack’s bedroom across the hall from mine and slid under his
king-size bed. From under Jack’s bed, I heard him folding the attic stairs closed, but he
didn’t come down to the second floor where I was hiding.
With no escape, I came out from under the bed, expecting to take my punishment.
Then I saw him up the staircase, still in the hallway on the third floor. He didn’t have the
baseball mitt, but took a key from his pocket to open the door to a room that had been
locked for as long I could remember.
When Jack entered that room, I wanted to run back to my bedroom unseen, but
my curiosity had gotten the best of me, drawing me back upstairs. On the landing, I
pushed the door open, just enough to see Jack facing away from me.
The room’s walls had been painted sky blue, the same as a crib and dresser. Jack
was sitting with his legs crossed on the hardwood floor. I slumped against the wall out-
side the door and fell asleep . . .
The next morning, I woke with a start. Jack’s iPhone was vibrating and skimming
along the hardwood floor of the blue room. I peeked through the narrow crack of the
open door and watched him. He looked groggy and seemed confused. He picked up the
phone and looked at the caller ID. He answered, “Hello . . . I need the rest of the week to
myself . . . you’ll have to take Bonnie back today. . . Next Saturday? Her birthday? I’d
rather not . . . OK—OK, I’ll think about it . . . no promises.”
Jack stuck the phone in his shirt pocket and huffed. Sitting on the floor and facing
the ceiling, he acted as if the room were spinning, making him dizzy. He stretched an arm
touching the slanted ceiling of the eaves. He grumbled and cursed. Except for the empty
blue crib and dresser, the room was barren. Attached to the crib was a mobile of plastic
baseball equipment: bat, ball, cap, a pair of cleats, catcher’s mask, chest protector,
and a mitt. Like icicles, they hung motionless, frozen in time.
A photo calendar of the New York Yankees hung on the wall, top players in
pinstripes from a decade ago when they’d been World Champs in 2009. Sunrise gleamed
through a dormered window backlighting faded curtains entwined with cobwebs. A few
dead wasps lay crumpled on the window sill.
He turned to the dresser, but tripped over a gallon can left open with a broad
brush standing upright in the hardened blue paint.
“Jesus!” he grumbled.
Off the dresser, Jack picked up a framed photo of a young boy swinging a
baseball bat. Another frame showed a young man in a baseball uniform with “Rutgers”
in red across a white jersey. Jack blew dust off the glass of the frame and coughed.
Next to that frame was a larger empty one, still sealed in opaque plastic.
Jack pulled out the key to lock the room behind him, but might have heard me
scrambling down the stairs. He didn’t see me when he looked down the staircase, because
I was already in my bed, shivering. I heard Jack shout, “Goddamn haunted house!”
I understood what “haunted” meant from Halloween trick-or-treating. I started to
shake under the pink comforter Gram had given me to bring to Jack’s house, but it gave
me little comfort.
Jack closed the door behind him and locked it with the dead-bolt’s click then
came downstairs to his bedroom.
I got out of bed and scampered across the room to peer from the crack of my
door. Jack tossed the key into a jewelry box atop his dresser. He took a gilded, framed
photo from his dresser and clutched it close to his chest. The photo was the same as one
at Gram and Gram’s house on their fireplace mantel. No one had spoken to me about
the young woman in the photo. I hadn’t asked. Once, when I’d remarked how pretty
the woman was, Gram had left the room in tears and Gramps had to leave for his
meeting at the Elks Club. It had been as if they hadn’t heard me, or just refused to.
My ears perked when Jack kissed the photo and said—“Lydia.”
No one had said it outright before, but I was sure Lydia was my mother.
“What lies behind us and what lies ahead
of us are tiny matters compared to what
lives within us.”― Henry David Thoreau
My recollection of spying on Jack faded, but the baseball mitt remained vivid in
my mind as Gram lit the candles on my birthday cake.
“Bet I can throw a baseball as good as any boy—even better,” I boasted.
I thought I’d finally worn down Jack’s resistance. “Okay, but only if you blow out
all seven candles—with one breath. If you do, I’ll get the mitt and we’ll have a catch. ”
His expression looked regretful, again—buyer’s remorse.
Gram and Gramps gave him disdainful looks. Their friends muttered asides to one
another. My girlfriends rooted for me, but the boys shook their heads as if Jack had made
a careless misjudgment of my competitive spirit.
Jack grinned, probably sure I’d lose the bet. How could my scrawny stature
muster enough breath to blow out more than one or two candles. I was barely 40 pounds
and under 40 inches tall, a runt—a squirt. Just on my appearance, Jack looked sure that I
couldn’t throw a baseball very far or with any speed or accuracy—case closed.
How could he know what I was capable of when he’d rarely seen me? I’d heard
Jack discuss baseball games with Gramps watching Yankee games on TV. I knew
baseball was something Jack was confident he knew more about than most. Sensing
Jack’s confidence that he’d win the wager, I was determined to prove him wrong.
“Promise?” I asked.
He nodded with a shake of my little hand. “Deal.”
I reared back with a deep breath then pursed my lips. Jack must have seen
determination in my eyes that reminded him of a pitcher in a jam on the mound facing a
batter for the final out. He measured all things in terms of baseball. With cheeks swollen,
I blew so hard that the topknot quivered on top of my head. The pink ribbon unraveled,
and my long, sandy-blond hair came unleashed, covering my face like a mop. I nearly fell
into the cake but balanced with both hands flat on the table. My eyes opened wide to see
the result of my effort. One candle still flickered, but a sudden breeze made the wick flare
for a moment before white smoke, like a burnt offering, trailed across the yard. The
seventh candle fizzled out, permeating the yard with the scent of melted wax.
My grandparents hugged me, my girlfriends cheered, and the boys looked at one
another knowingly with shakes of their heads. Jack frowned at me when I folded my
arms and beamed with victory. I was trying to show the kind of spunk Jack seemed to
encourage in his baseball team. I may have won the wager, but Jack looked unconvinced,
as if it was just good luck for me and bad luck—as usual—for him.
Staring with resentment at me, he flinched as if he suddenly recognized some-
thing in me, but was trying to fight against that feeling because it made him uncomfortable.
He’d become accustomed to his hardened disassociation from family. He seemed to work
at that daily as much as he devoted himself to baseball.
I watched his reaction, wondering if Jack had seen some of himself in me, some-
thing he hadn’t noticed before. My eyes were brilliant green. I often wondered why they
weren’t dark brown like Jack’s. I wished they were, just to feel a closer connection to
him, so close I’d see the world through his eyes, knowing everything he knew.
Excited, my eyes sparkled like precious emeralds from a hidden treasure suddenly
unearthed. It was my forthright, in-your-face attitude that had to remind Jack of himself,
especially his style as a teacher and baseball coach. He’d raised his voice to me for the
first time, but I was glad to have his attention, even for just a moment.
The party guests gradually dispersed then I turned to Jack. “Let’s go home, Pop. I
want to play catch with you before it gets too dark.”
“Your father needs some coffee before you head home,” Gram said.
Gramps poured Jack a cup and handed it to him.
Though Jack agreed, he looked as if he regretted losing the bet to me. He seemed
relieved when a thunderstorm kicked up as we left for his home, hopefully delaying our
catch for another day. He must have thought I’d forget about his promise, but my willful
expression told him—no way.
* * *
Jack drove me home in his beat-up, red Ram pickup. I remained quiet the whole
way, which made Jack turn to me in a rare moment.
“Too much cake and ice cream?” he asked. “Your tummy hurting?”
“I’m OK,” I said, just glad he was looking at me for a change.
At his home, I waited on the third-floor landing while Jack pulled down the
folding stairs and climbed to the attic. In the stuffy air and dim light, I heard him scuff-
ling for the blue box I knew contained the baseball mitt in the shadows of the eaves. I
heard the wind from outside blow open the shutters on a dormered attic window, which
must have startled him.
“You OK, Pop?”
He grunted then dropped the mitt down the folding stairs at my feet. Lightning
flashed outside and thunder boomed close by.
“We can’t go outside if there’s lighting,” he said.
“It’s clearing up!” I yelled, grabbing the mitt and scurrying downstairs. “It’ll
be fine in a few minutes.”
During a brief downpour, Jack kept looking at his watch, knowing it was close to
my bedtime. I inspected the mitt, flexing the fingers, rubbing the webbing and punching
my small fist into its pocket. It was a Mariano Rivera model, but I noticed another name
burnt into the heel near the thumb. It read “Junior.”
I was about to ask Jack about it, but the rain had stopped. “It’s clearing up,”
I said. “Come on, Pop. Let’s go.”
Jack stuck his head out the backdoor that led to the driveway. The storm had
cleared. He followed me to the driveway, still hoping for an out. I stood in front of
the white garage door beneath the overhead spotlight. In the pink glow of twilight after
the storm, the air at dusk smelled sweet. Fitting all my small fingers into just two fingers
of the mitt, I pounded it with my left fist the same way I’d seen Jack do it in the attic and
how his players smacked the pockets of their mitts on the field. The well-oiled leather felt
smooth and its aroma filled my nostrils.
“We don’t have any baseballs,” he said. “I have some at school in my locker, but I
can’t get back in there without the principal’s permission and—”
“Get a stone from under that oak tree!” I shouted.
“Too dangerous.”
“I won’t hurt ya, Pop.” I turned to the apple tree beside the driveway. “How
about an apple?”
Jack gathered a few apples from under the tree. He lobbed one underhand, just to
my left so he wouldn’t hit me. It rolled between my legs. I frowned and huffed.
“C’mon, gimme another one!” I shouted.
He looped another apple over my head, but I leaped and caught it. To his sur-
prise, I threw it back to him, waist high and hard enough to sting his bare hands. The
apple splattered sticky, brown juice, leaving a stain across his white polo shirt.
“Take it easy!” he shouted, shaking the sting from his fingertips and rubbing the
apple’s nectar from his hands onto his jeans. “Do you like throwing with your left hand?
Maybe you’re a righty.”
“I throw fine with my left,” I said with confidence, having thrown an old, moldy
tennis ball I’d found in Gramps’ garage. I’d mimicked the infielders I’d watched on
Jack’s team by throwing the tennis ball against the garage door and repeatedly catching it
on a bounce, then throwing it back against the door. I had no glove to wear then, so I’d
tried throwing and catching with both hands and felt no obvious difference.
Jack lobbed another apple underhand, but I folded my arms in protest, letting it
smash into the garage door. A stain dripped down the white surface.
I yelled, “Throw overhand—like the boys!”
Jack grumbled then threw another apple overhand, but easy. I caught the apple
before it hit the ground then whipped it back at him even harder than the last one,
catching him off guard. The apple hit him in the chest, making him stumble and fall
backwards gasping for breath.
I ran up to him. Disoriented, he stared glassy-eyed at me from the ground.
“Come on! That was an easy one!” From the foggy look in Jack’s eyes I figured
he must be seeing double like I’d seen in cartoons. “I bet I can throw a baseball even
harder than I throw an apple.”
“Maybe,” he agreed, regaining focus, “but no more bets. I’ll get a few baseballs
tomorrow. Then I’ll see if you can throw like the boys—or not.”
“I’m sorry you lost your teaching job,” I said. “Hey! Instead of coaching high
school—you could be my Little League coach.”
Jack laughed aloud for the first time in years. I couldn’t be sure if he was amused
at his come down from varsity high school coach to Little League or the prospect that I
could ever throw a baseball like anything other than his concept of “throwing like a girl.”
Underhand with a softball was one thing—hardball, in Jack’s rigid rule book was quite
another.
Toms River where Gram and Gramps lived was the County Seat where a few
exceptional girls had played on boys’ teams, and had even gone to the Little League
World Series playoffs in Williamsport, Pennsylvania. If anyone could teach me how
to pitch a baseball, Jack knew he was well-qualified. As compelling as that idea may
have felt to him, Jack was a baseball purist, old-fashioned to the core. Baseball for
boys—softball for girls.
If he’d told me right then that he was dead set against my playing Little League
with boys, I most likely would have forgotten about it just to please him. Then maybe
he’d let me come live with him. The thought of my interest in playing baseball surely
gave Jack fitful nights that even his alcohol consumption could not abate.
Later that same night, Jack tucked me into bed and stared at me with curiosity.
I didn’t care why he looked at me, only that he did. I held his big rough hand in my grasp
never wanting to let go.
“Pop, this mitt is the best. Can I keep it?”
He shrugged. “I suppose . . . why not?”
“It’s a Mariano Rivera model, but Gramps told me he was a righty.”
“He was . . . and the greatest closing pitcher in the majors. He saved more
games in his career with the Yankees than any pitcher in the majors ever has.”
“Why does my mitt say Junior?”
Jack took a deep breath. “It was meant . . . for your brother,” he said with a twitch.
“I have a brother?”
“Had . . . he died.”
“What happened?”
“He died with your mom . . . he was your twin.”
“Why did he die and not me?” I asked.
“Your mom always had to do things her way. She didn’t want to give birth in a
hospital. She wanted to do it naturally at home with a midwife to help her. I tried to talk
her out of it when we learned there would be twins, but she insisted on having her own
way. She’d studied lots of information on the internet and found a mid-wife that suited
her. She stopped going to her obstetrician for sonograms. If she had, we would have
known what was happening. You and your brother were attached by the same cord inside
your mom, but the cord had strangled your brother, cutting off his oxygen and blood
flow. That caused toChic shock to your mom, which the doctors hadn’t discovered until
she was rushed to the ER at County General. It was too late. When your brother was
still-born, withered on the vine, they removed you safely by caesarian.”
“That’s so sad,” I said, stroking his arm. “Please, tell me about my mom.”
He turned away and sighed. “You’re too young. Maybe when you’re more
grown up. I can’t now. You’d better get some sleep”
“Are you still angry at my mom?”
My question seemed to jolt him with an expression of confusion as if to ask, How
could I ever be angry with Lydia, my life mate, my true love? Yet somehow he was.
“I was mad at everyone and everything!” he said elevating his tone. Then that
release of pent-up anger seemed to calm him. “I’ll get a few baseballs and you can
practice throwing them to me.”
“You mean it?”
“Sure. I can teach you a lot about pitching. I pitched varsity at Rutgers.”
I recalled seeing the name printed in scarlet across his white uniform in the
framed photo in the blue room.
“Can I really keep this mitt? Even if it was meant for my brother.”
“Who else would use it?”
I got up on my knees in bed to give Jack a hug. I kissed his rough cheek then
nestled down under the quilt. I waved to him as he went to the door and left it open a
crack. He waved back. I clutched the mitt to my chest and inhaled the scent of the leather.
I brushed my little fingers across the letters where Jack had burned in the name—Junior.
I closed my eyes with a peaceful smile then stared at the ceiling. I tried to imagine my
twin brother.
As if he might answer me, I whispered, “I promise I’ll try to be the best baseball
player for Pop.”
I remember that birthday as if it were yesterday, not just because Jack had paid
attention to me for the first time and I got to play catch with him, but a new awareness
had come over me. I wasn’t just this scrawny little wisp of a girl with the big green eyes
like my mom’s. Gram and Gramps may have seen their lost daughter in me, but inside
my head was another me, a boy everyone thought had died. From that day on, I vowed
to keep Junior alive within me.
“Love is the ability and willingness to allow those that
you care for to be what they choose for themselves
without any insistence that they satisfy you.”― Wayne Dyer
Indian Summer
by
Gerald Arthur Winter
There’s no better time of the year to hike a mountain trail than mid-October in the
northeast when New York State’s autumn foliage is peaking with bursts of color—marigold
yellow, reds from raspberry to plum, and carrot orange flickering in between like flames.
Warnings of a severe winter ahead were forecast months ago after a drought last May and
June followed by a hurricane in September that caused more flooding than wind damage.
As a result, the foliage had soaked up the rain, providing an exceptional depth of lasting
fall hues not seen in decades.
The first hint of the preamble to a cold winter came the week before, right after
Columbus Day with the first freeze. I awoke the past three mornings with the lawn frosted
like coconut icing on a cake. After the hurricane’s heavy downpours last month, puddles
froze solid in the morning chill. I watch from my kitchen window as schoolchildren jump
on the frozen puddles to break the ice just as I had as a kid so long ago.
I sip my first cup of morning coffee as I watch the children on my day off. I work
only four days a week now, part-time as a crossing guard for the middle-school up the
street. The work, if you want to call it such, has a double purpose: it helps me remember
. . . but also forget.
The kids help me remember my own childhood, which often feels like yesterday.
But yesterday, Tuesday, is often just a blank. That’s why I chose Wednesday for my one
weekday off. Hump Day gives me focus so my Monday-Tuesday and Thursday-Friday
shifts at the corner of Elm and Mayfair holding up a red stop-sign don’t all blend
together. Last Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday was that stretch of morning frost.
The kids at the crosswalks with their wonderful questions and bright outlooks
help me forget I’m alone, that Alice died, and my days are filled with more memories
now than plans for the future. My future is waking up and hoping I’ll wake again
tomorrow.
I try to hold onto small things now, like seeing Mrs. Baxter across the street
planting her tulip bulbs along her driveway last Saturday. She must’ve heard about
the frost coming. But it caught me off guard, freezing my butt at the corner because
I hadn’t brought my winter coats, gloves, and caps down from the attic yet. I used
to depend on Alice for that, but she’s been gone five years now.
I got prepared last night to take my mountain hike on the same trail I used
to take with my older brother Mike when we were kids . . . he’s gone, too. I haven’t
told anyone about my plan to hike this morning because I know I’ll get all that jabber
about a man my age hiking alone in the woods.
My daughter got me one of those smartphones with a GPS for my seventy-fifth
birthday in May, so I figure I’ll be fine. Best part about the fancy phone is the photos I
can take. I even got one of those selfie-sticks in case I want to take my picture with my
arm around a black bear. Just kidding. That’s my light-hearted nature. My daughter
wouldn’t appreciate my humor about that.
I’ve packed myself a lunch in my backpack and I’m heading to my car to drive
to the trail right now. I’ll be home before sunset and no one will be the wiser so keep
it to yourself. Won’t my daughter be surprised when I show her all my pretty pictures
of the autumn leaves. That’s when I’ll tell her about my solo venture, not before.
I’ve got my winter jacket, scarf, gloves, and a leather hat with earflaps, so
even if it’s freezing up in those mountains this morning, I’ll be just fine.
I’ve parked my car at the base of the mountain and I’m heading up the
trail, which the county just opened a month ago after being closed to the public
after a college student taking this hike was mauled and killed by a 500 pound
black bear just out of hibernation. They says that bear might’ve been 600 pounds
after feeding for a month or two. Local papers called him “Bearzilla.”
Shame about the young man who died, but I’ve hiked this trail a hundred
times over the years from the 50’s till now, so I’m not concerned. I know enough
to stand clear of a mama bear with cubs.
It’s pretty brisk when I got out of the car, so I’m glad that I’ve dressed for
the morning freeze. But soon the exertion of the climb with my walking stick and
my backpack with my lunch and bottles of water weighing me down, has made me
sweat. I’ll still keep my scarf and gloves on, but I can stop to take a breather along
the way and remove my cap to dry my head with the old dish towel I keep in my
backpack. Used to use the towel to keep a fish from slipping out of my grasp when
I was removing the hook. Alice would complain if I came home with my hands
smelling like trout. Alice . . . she’d be on my case about hiking alone at my age.
Being Wednesday, there are no weekend hikers crowding the trail so there
were no other cars with mine where I parked, and after an hour trek toward the top
of the ridge, I haven’t seen another person yet. I enjoy the quiet and I’ve stopped a
few times to catch my breath, loosen my scarf, and just listen. With the sun up, the
autumn colors seem to burst all around me like a fireworks on Fourth of July.
I’ve reached the top of the ridge where there’s a glacier lake that’s two miles
long east to west and a mile wide north to south. I sit on a stone wall at the east end
of the lake to gather my thoughts before I take the two-hour walk around the lake.
It takes that long because of the rocky trail around the lake with boulders you have
to either climb over or squeeze between. The stone wall looks out over a dam that
control the overflow from the lake as it had during the September hurricane.
As I get up to begin my walk, I feel dizzy and sit back down again. I unravel
my scarf and put it into my backpack along with my gloves and hat. I unzip my
fleece jacket and flap it like a hawk’s wings to cool off. My forehead feels hot to
the touch so I take out my smartphone to see my position on the lake with my
GPS, then check the weather to be sure no squalls are heading toward the lake.
“Seventy-five?” I say aloud and with question. “That can’t be. It was 27
degrees on my back porch when I went to the car this morning only a couple of
hours ago. It’s almost eleven o’clock.”
I tap the screen of my phone as if it would make a difference. Old habits are
hard to break. I take a few sips of water and just one bite of my ham sandwich for
energy and some salt to keep me from dehydrating because my head is soaking wet
from the heat. I stand and stretch, wishing I saw a fellow hiker to say, “Nice weather.”
Just to get a response. I guess I have to believe my eyes because my body, like my
phone, is telling me it’s getting close to 80 degrees before noon in late October after
we had three nights in a row that dipped into the upper 20’s.
I roll up my jacket and put it into my backpack, because it’s become too hot to
wear even without hiking around the lake. That’s what I came up here to do, so I take
a deep breath and set my pace. Without any snags, I’ll be back to the damn by 1:30 p.m.
then I’ll eat the rest of my sandwich. It will be all downhill from there to my car. I’ll be
home before 4 p.m.
The first half-hour is easy, mostly level ground, though rough with roots and
jagged stones that could make me trip. The thought of falling down slows my pace. I
still haven’t seen any other hikers. For the first time I’m glad my daughter got me the
smartphone, not for the photos but for calling for help in case I fall down. The GPS
will get someone to me a lot quicker, even a helicopter if needed.
What am I saying? I know this trail like the back of my hand. I’ve known every
turn and hazard for most of my life. I’ll just enjoy the hike in this warm weather with
all these fantastic colors reflected on the lake.
I come to the bend in the path that takes me right up to the lake’s northern
shore. In the shade from the trees along the northern bank, the lake still has some
black ice that hasn’t melted. It’s a glacier lake so the water’s always cold and the
past three nights may have created a layer of ice over the lake thick enough to walk
on at this altitude.
My phone, even in the shade, says 78 degrees before noon, so that thin ice
won’t last long. In this heat it will all be melted before I return to the dam.
As I reach the halfway mark at the eastern shore I see a dozen dear drinking
at from the lake. Their coats have already turned that greyer tone and thicker for the
coming winter. Like me, they must have been caught off guard by this odd flash of
warm weather. As I pass the gutted remains of an early 20th century mansion once
owned by a millionaire on this lake, I see a flash of unexpected colors along the
natural stone foundation of the ruin.
“It can’t be,” I say aloud, seeing crocuses, blue, white, and yellow, growing in
the moss between the stones. Then I see daffodils, some all yellow, others with white
petals and orange pistols. These are spring flowers. The unseasonal warm weather has
confused them.
By the time I’ve made the turn and I’m ten minutes from the dam, I’m shocked
to see a cascade of bright yellow along the southern ridge to my right and the lakeshore
to my left. It’s forsythia in full bloom. Without seeing another person to discuss the logic
of this phenomena of nature, I question my own mind.
“Is it really spring? Have I lost my sense of time? Was the three-day freeze
really the end of March rather than the end of October as I thought it was this
morning? If only someone else would come by so I could ask them.
I hear my stomach growl and quicken my pace so I can rest by sitting on the
stone wall at the dam where I’ll eat the rest of my sandwich. It feels good to get off
my feet. The sandwich tastes wonderful with the dill pickle I included in the zip-lock
plastic bag. The walk around the lake was invigorating. I feel better than I have in
some time. Maybe I should plan to do this hike more often, but if winter is as cold
as predicted, the trails will have deep snow and become hazardous with ice from
the daily melting and refreezing.
Though I’ve come to enjoy my part-time work as a crossing guard, and I look
forward to seeing the kids at the crosswalk tomorrow morning, a part of me would
rather stay right here with all this autumn color yet summer warmth. I could stay
in this day forever if it wasn’t for . . . well, there’s no one to share it with.
As I stand to head back down the trail to my car I see another odd sight for
late October, but at least it’s at a distance, maybe five yards away on the path. I take
a couple of short steps forward and it coils to strike—a copperhead.
It knows I’m here but it must be as confused as the rest of nature today. I
speak to it to let it know I want to pass by, but without doing it any harm.
“I bet the freeze these past few nights slowed you down before you had a
chance to find your hibernation burrow. Go ahead. Find it now, but leave me be.
I can’t get past to the downward trail to my car unless you move. Even with a
smartphone, a snake bite could kill me before I get help, so it’s you or me. I don’t
want to kill you, but neither do I want to be killed. Just leave and we’ll both be
fine. Deal?”
“Let him leave!” a voice comes from behind me. A gentle hand touches my
shoulder and her voice whispers in my ear, “I’ve been waiting for you to come up
to the lake.”
I turn but don’t recognize her at first. For a moment, I think it’s my daughter,
that somehow she got wind of my plan to take a hike in the mountains alone. But it’s
the first time I realize how much my daughter looks more like Alice than she looks
like me.
She grabs my walking stick from where I’ve left it on the stone wall. She
uses it like a spear thrusting it through the serpent’s triangular head. Then she
shakes the dead snake off the end of my walking stick into the lake. She hands
the stick back to me.
“Am I dreaming?” I ask her. “I want to stay here with you on this perfect day.”
“No. You must go back.” She nods toward the lake where she thrown the
dead snake. “He’d have kept you here, but you’ve got to back home. There’s news
—good news for you at home.”
“I don’t want to leave you,” I tell her.
“I’ll be here waiting when you come back, but it’s not your time. Be careful
on the trail going back down.”
“What good news could there be greater than finding my Alice looking how
she did the day we met?”
“There was an error on the screening. You’re fine for now and . . . you’re
going to have a grandson. He has a single mom, so he’ll need you. Please go back.
Do it for me.”
“Is that why everything is out of sync?”
“Yes.”
“How will I know when it’s the right time to come back to you?”
“I’ll be with you again and forever next Indian Summer.”
Children of The Dawn
By Meg Smith
It was a rare find -- berries, and glistening green leaves.
There seemed to be no one else around, apart from some squabbling birds, distant in the piercing blue sky.
Even if they flew in, they probably weren't a threat. They might even be a catch, if she could snatch them by the wing or claw.
Her mother had always said, go for what you can gather. Right now, what she could gather were the berries and leaves.
She would have kept some for later, but later seemed a vague idea. Her hunger was right now.
When enough time had passed, it could be easy to forget what eating food even felt like.
She could remember things, but mainly, her life -- as long as she knew it -- was about the present.
In the present, she was all alone. For the first time since she could remember. She’d been walking, through cycles of day and night, alone.
The one thing she was certain of -- many of her people, people who looked, acted and hunted as she did -- were not part of the present.
They were in the past.
Their bodies had lain, like uneven dunes, covered by the wind with loose sand. But not for long.
She knew the prey-eating birds would come, as they always did. She could feel sadness, sadness about not talking to her mother, or sisters, or her mother’s sister.
Even one of the few males she knew and thought of as father.
Right now all the world was contained in a small space of hot, dry air, and berries and leaves too precious to waste.
When the berries and leaves had filled her, there was no point in staying. And staying still was dangerous, anyway. Barking echoed in the yellowing hills.
It was time to walk again. Walking upright had been a great leap for her kind, but she did not know it.
Walking got someone from one place to another. Running could move a person away from danger. Lying down and sleeping were dangerous, but somehow, necessary.
She was good at finding places to sleep. Between rocks, under crevices, and her sleep was light. In her sleep she could hear the footsteps of animals passing by.
She had no course to plot, across a landscape bleary and unchanging. Dreams and waking sometimes difficult to distinguish. Dreams were what she saw and heard while sleeping. Sometimes she heard her mother’s voice, and her eyes flew open, but no one was there.
When she awoke, she didn’t stay long. She got up, and kept walking.
It had rained in the night. Water splashed in puddles. She knelt and drank furtively, and left. Lingering was an easy way to end up hunted.
The water restored her. She felt herself walking tall, although, in reality, she was not.
And she didn't care. She liked her short forehead, her short hair, the shape of her hands and feet, her belly. The compact trunk of her belly. The fur apron tied at her waist.
When she saw someone looking back at her from the water, as a child, her mother informed her she was looking at herself. It seemed absurd that she could be standing at the edge of the water and also looking up from it, but her mother assured her it was so.
She would never pause to think that her memories were keeping her alive. Every time she thought of her mother or something her mother said to do, it was like her mother was there, even though her mother wasn’t.
Still, with each step, sometimes, memories would come. Like her mother saying: "One day, you will be a mother, and pass all these things to your child."
She took that at face value. She knew she was a female, as were most of the people in her world. Males were vague, dreamlike, often away, usually hunting, sometimes laughing, sometimes fighting. Not that females didn't fight, sometimes, but someone always intervened.
People came from inside a female's belly. They came out as if fighting, as if mother and child were fighting each other. Sometimes one of them lost. Sometimes, they both did. They became part of the quiet, drifting landscape, not dreaming or fighting anymore.
Now, some distance behind her, they were all like that. They had all crumbled, their eyes clouded, their faces masks of nothing. They coughed and shook, and then, they as if sleeping but staring at the endless sky.
She left because there was no reason to stay, no one to talk to, and animals would come, and that was never safe.
The sun, bright and sad, was shifting into the wedge of earth, and shadows grew from the hills, the ledges.
Her feet were hot, as if complaining. She knew that feeling. It said, time to stop.
There was a rock, and she sat down. The rock felt cold, but it was good. Her fur apron was getting matted and frayed. But she didn't know what to do about it.
For the first time, in a long time of being alone, she realized she was not alone.
Someone was walking toward her. She started a bit, stood up, but first, gathering a stone in one hand.
She was especially startled when the stranger came into view and she could make out the features of the stranger's face. It was like no face she had seen, ever, on anyone.
This face had a high brow, a small nose, wide lips, and a blockish chin. It was impossible to tell anything except that the stranger was in no way part of her group, or any group she'd seen.
The stranger may as well have fallen from the sky. For all she knew, the stranger did.
The stranger stopped. And was looking at her.Her fingers played on the rock in her hand, cradling it close in her palm.
The stranger was a male; rare though it was to see a male, his squared shape marked him as such. He was wearing a garment about the waist, as she was, but she could not tell what it was made of. It was unique. It had colors. It did not appear to be made from animal hide.
The stranger opened his mouth, and started talking. She had not the slightest idea what he was saying. As he stepped closer, she gripped the rock tighter.
And then, he held a hand forward. But, to her amazement, it was open, and in it was something that looked like food. And he was holding it out to her.
Here was food, food that looked and smelled good, and an odd-looking person offering it. But her stomach gnawed at her.
The stranger did not do anything that otherwise signified a threat. His eyebrows raised, and an expression formed on his face that looked pleased.
She was thinking just to snatch the food, hurl the stone at him, and run.
But she only took the food, and stood there devouring it, as he watched.
They walked along together for a while. He continued to talk his strange sounds. At least, it seemed like talking. She answered back in the short, no-nonsense syllables that comprised the words of her small world.
The walked, side by side, as the air darkened around them.
He was taller. His walk was strange. It was not the walk of someone always aware of everything around, friends and foe, poised for flight. This walk was the walk of someone who didn't much worry about those things, or was unaware of them, or perhaps commanded them.
Which seemed strange, yet logical. She still held the rock.
Before long, they came to a hilly place, with rocks and small openings, and the unmistakable smoke of a fire. The fire was spitting up sparks, getting ready to die.
There were several figures sitting or hunched around it, and a murmur came from them, similar sounds to what this strange person made. The light was very dim now, but she realized, they were the same as he. This was a whole new people she had discovered.
What she really wanted to know was whether they were friendly, or not. Because there were a lot of them. She realized that she had to hope they were friends. Otherwise, she had just one rock, and her swift feet to carry her away.
The male she had been walking with started making gestures to get their attention, and his voice grew loud. He pointed to her. They looked up. Some of them looked deeply surprised. She had seen that look. One of them looked angry.
She set her mind to making out the sounds they made, and what they might mean. After a while, some of what they said began to make some sense. It was not happy news.
Her friend, if that's what he was, he had done something terrible and stupid.
But not everyone felt that way, that was clear. Because some of them laughed.
She was getting tired, and thinking about running. And then, glancing back slightly, she saw more figures, with similar shapes to their shadows.
She had spent the past several days and nights working to stay alive. She was going to have to keep doing that, but running didn't seem to be an option. But, she noticed, there were lots of stones around. That was comforting, a little.
There was that dying fire. She could throw ashes into their eyes. She saw someone do that, once, to scare off a big animal.
Her confidence came back.
The male was now gesturing to her, and touched her shoulder. He was saying something directly to her. The sounds in themselves didn't make much sense, but the tone was clear. You can stay here.
The group was moving into the shelter of the small crevice. The air was chilly. The male motioned for her to come with them. She began to grasp that she was not just entering a shelter for the night, but some kind of new world. There were tools, and items for covering the body that she had never before seen.
Her mind riveted, as never before. She had a mad urge to touch everything, use everything, blurt out questions that maybe they did or didn't understand. As tired as she was, she didn't want to sleep.
But that's what everyone was preparing to do. Before long, her heavy eyelids betrayed her. Others were already asleep, except for a few other males, who seemed to be standing outside, on guard.
Understanding all these new things would have to wait.
It seemed only moments later, she was waking again. She caught the scent, of the male, before she could open her eyes. All was dark, apart from his shadow. He was moving toward her. Distantly, her mother's voice was reprimanding her. She pushed it from her mind. Everything he had to touch, smell, taste...it was within her grasp. Even as fear lurched in her stomach, her arms, her mouth, were reaching.
From the rustles here and there around them, they were not alone.
By morning, light was bright and harsh. A fire was snapping, and smoke made its way to the entrance.
She sat up, feeling hollow, slightly ashamed. And yet, feeling that she would do what they had done all over again. She looked about.
Eyes were touching her, regarding her.
She stood up. She heard a voice that sounded angry. She heard the low protest, of her friend, the male What they had done together, she guessed, had made someone unhappy. Maybe, someone important.
Then, just as quickly, it seemed to be forgotten. A female, who looked to be almost the age of her mother, passed by her. She started to wave to her, then stopped. This female was not pleased. After a moment she surmised, this is the mother. She's angry. But it doesn't count.
Which was strange. Where she came from, making a mother, or aunt, unhappy was not a worthy goal. Here, their anger seemed to matter no more than a passing cloud.
A gathering seemed to be taking place, a discussion.
More gestures. It didn't take long to realize this was about looking for food. Which made total sense. She moved with them. There were those angry looks, here and there, but she still moved with them. Watched what they did. There was a place to gather more berries, twigs. She did as they did.
Everyone's anger seemed to be subsiding. There was even laughter. Her belly bothered her, again. Someone was laughing at her.
But throwing a rock at that person, didn't seem prudent. She recalled times when her mother rose to act, and sometimes, simply waited. Maybe this was one of those waiting times.
Morning and night, came and rose in its cycles. Some nights they held each other, closely, feverishly. Other times, they simply slept.
He talked and talked. They all talked a lot. They laughed a lot, and she could sense when that laughter was directed at her. It was not often, but it happened.
She learned, about the tools. He showed them to her. A long spear. A knife for cutting branches.
Most of the time, however, they were not together. He went off with other males, and she was motioned over to the females. She kept up, doing her share of gathering and even hunting small animals.
She and the male would be together again at night. But sometimes, not even then.
And it was less and less often.
One night, while the others slept, she realized slowly, terribly, that she could hear his voice, and someone else's. A voice not unlike hers, but not hers.
Something else happened for the first time. Tears coursed down her face. She tried to hide it. Somehow she felt it was not good to let anyone know.
Their words began to make sense, too. She imitated them, but her sounds came out very different from theirs. This sometimes sparked laughter, but not always. And, it became clear, what some of them were saying about her.
Even the lions and deer do things you can understand.
She looks like one from the group we saw, one time.
Why did he bring her here.
They're both young. Young and stupid.
Well, he's learning.
What's to become of her.
She helps gather food. She can make fire. She has some use.
She had use to him, but not anymore.
Then, a smirk.
Her stomach ached, and certain leaves seemed to help.
It wasn't long before she realized what was happening. The same thing that happened to her mother, and other females she knew. Even some of the females here.
There was movement within, as if a whole world was growing inside her.
That angry older female was yelling again. The older male who always seemed to be around was shouting over her. Their voices wrestled, like two antelopes, locking and clacking horns.
She ran her hands over her belly. A protective feeling rose ferociously within her.
She glanced around. At him. Their eyes met, only for a moment, and then he looked away.
This sparked sadness and fear. She wrapped her arms around her belly. Then, she began to make sounds, soft sounds. She did not fully understand them herself. But she knew something.
She had something, of her own.
The day came. She cried out in pain. the fight was beginning within her. She knew it, had seen it before.
When this happened, in the past, others would gather around, shouting in encouragement, sometimes holding the female’s hands, making soft, encouraging sounds.
None of that happened this time. In fact, they all seemed to pull away from her.
Then, grudgingly, one or two of the females came forward. They made sounds, terse and impatient.
She did not look back on the pain. She heard crying. The crying of a new life.
It was a girl, like her. She held her close. She felt a thunder in her chest. She wanted to run to the top of the hill in joy, but she was too tired, too weak. Instead, she cooed to her new baby.
Her baby grew, and was strong. Other babies grew, and were strong. They played and slept together. But her baby was not among them.
Each day, as she watched the other babies, growing, learning, but never with her baby in their circle, she grew afraid.
The fear would not leave.
One night, as they slept, she got up. Her baby whimpered, but she put a finger to her lips and made a shooshing sound.
She gathered her up in her arms, and slowly stood up.
The males standing guard turned to look at her. For a moment, she thought they would try to stop her. But instead, they looked away.
She did not look back.
Once again, it was time to walk.
She nursed her baby. The days were warm now, but the oppressive heat was a ways away.
She came to a place with a river. The water ran low, but cool. She drank, and cupped her hand with water for her baby to drink. Her baby was able to walk a bit on her own now, her tiny hand firmly grasping her mother’s.
What they did not know, and could not know, at that time, is that they weren’t really alone.
There were others, like herself, who had survived, through strength or insight or just plain luck.
Some of them, like herself, had encountered people. People like themselves and yet not -- people who had new tools, new and sometimes better ways of doing things.
But people who also looked down on them, saw them as having uses, and perhaps even formed bonds of affection with them. But these people did not see them as fully their own.
Some of them, like her, came away with a child.
Those children were vessels of the worlds of their parents. Resilience, cunning, and even cruelty but also cooperation and kindness, were entwined within them, in the spiral of their DNA.
Those children grew, and walked toward each other.
None of them knew it, but they would soon build their own world, together, in a strange new dawn.
A Stitch in Time
by
Gerald Arthur Winter
The sofa is delivered on a rainy afternoon on April 1, 1949. The
three-pillowed furniture is wrapped in plastic and cushioned from impact
by newspapers rolled into balls and taped at its blunt corners. Wearing
canary-yellow, hooded raincoats, two hulking deliverymen carry the sofa
from the Gimbel’s truck down a plank and up our front steps. They turn
the sofa sideways to fit through the foyer entrance to our home in Queens,
New York. The front door has been taken off its hinges so the sofa will fit
through the doorway, but on the sofa’s entry, the molding around the
door gets scraped by a sharp corner to bare wood.
My mother shrieks over the damaged molding, then clears the way
for our family’s major purchase. The two grunting bearers place the sofa
beneath a three-by-four foot mirror that was a wedding gift to my parents
from Grandma Hecker in 1940. I’m in kindergarten and my brother Bobby
is in third grade. We watch from the kitchen where we’ve been instructed
to remain silent until the sofa’s delivery is complete.
Mom tips the men a quarter each for their efforts then waves
goodbye to the men from our front door, which they’ve put back in
place. But now the door creaks at its hinges when opening or closing.
Mom is glad the men took the sofa’s packaging with them, but they’ve
left behind the newspapers covering the floor and carpeting to protect
them from the mud they’ve tramped in. Large muddy footprints from
the men’s galoshes have been stamped onto last Sunday’s NY
Journal-American newspaper. The Katzenjammer Kids, The Little
King, and Gasoline Alley lay soaked in the funny papers’ section.
“Your dad will have to touch up the molding with paint and
oil the hinges,” Mom says, waving us into the living room to show
us the sofa upholstered with a pattern of autumn leaves—red,
orange, and yellow. “I’ll make light blue slipcovers for the summer,”
Mom announces. “Isn’t it beautiful?”
Bobby and I look at each other wondering why she asked,
since our opinions have never counted before.
Always inquisitive, Bobby asks, “How do you make slipcovers?”
Mom nods toward her Singer sewing machine with the foot
pedal and says, “I’ll take measurements, buy the material, then sew
them together and add zippers. It will be like having two sofa’s for
the price of one. ”
I look at the Singer then back at Mom with doubt, but she
proves me wrong by the time school lets out for summer vacation.
I’m nervous about the change from kindergarten to first grade, but
figure my summer adventures will provide an escape from my worries.
Bobby and I begin the first day of summer by playing hide ‘n’ seek.
He’s in the kitchen seated at the table with his eyes closed and his head
buried in his folded arms. He counts, “Five, ten, fifteen, twenty, twenty-five,
thirty . . .”
I run around our house through our bedrooms until I come into the
living room and see my reflection in the big mirror centered above the new
sofa with its light-blue slipcovers. In stocking feet, I have to stand on the
soft sofa to see my face in the mirror. I wish I could pass through this
looking glass just like Alice.
Feeling trapped, I dive onto the sofa, but its slipcovers smell like
they’ve just rolled off a factory’s loom.
Bobby’s voice hits a high pitch, shouting, “Ninety! Ninety-five! One
hundred! Here I come, ready or not!”
Head first, like a snake, I wriggle my three-foot-four-inch body under
the sofa’s seat cushions, but I’m surprised how much room there is for me
concealed in that cavernous darkness. The factory smell of the slipcovers is
as intoxicating as gasoline when Dad lets me watch him fill the tank of his
1941 Lincoln Zephyr. I love its running boards and the oval-shaped rear
window that makes it feel like Flash Gordon’s strato-sled. It’s painted a
color I’ve never heard of, which make it even more special—maroon--
which seems to echo the sound its powerful engine. Maroon-roon!
As I think about Dad’s automobile, and how he complained that
the price of gas going to nineteen cents a gallon was too expensive for
his sixteen-cylinder engine, Bobby’s voice comes closer to the sofa
wear I’m hiding.
“I’m gonna find you soon,” he warns me. “You better not go in
the cellar and hide in the coal bin. You’ll get so dirty from the soot.
Mom will have a hissy fit.”
I peek from between the cushions, but Bobby can’t see me.
When he comes closer and sits on the sofa, I hold my breath.
“I’m gonna getcha!” he shouts, but I’m not sure if it’s the smell
of the slipcovers or the lack of air beneath the cushions that makes his
voice sound muffled even though he’s right beside me.
Then I hear Mom calling to us from the kitchen, but her voice
sounds so far away. I feel as if I’m losing my hearing, and then I hear
only my pulse in my head and my shallow breathing beneath the
cushions. I think I’ve fallen asleep, because it becomes so quiet until
I hear our front doorbell ring. It rings several times, but neither Mom
nor Bobby go to the front door. Figuring Bobby has given up trying to
find me, I follow the sliver of light between the cushions and come out
from the sofa. I go to the front door where the chips in the molding
are gone. Instead, there’s horizontal pencil marks and scribblings:
___________ Bobby 5’ 2” June 1954
___________ Gerry 4’ 7” “ “
___________ Bobby 4’ 9” June 1953
___________ Gerry 4’ 5” “ “
___________ Bobby 4’ 6” June 1952
___________ Gerry 4’ 2 “ “
___________ Bobby 4’ 4” June 1951
___________ Gerry 3” 8 “ “
What does it mean? I open the front door and see a forest across
the street and a taller, skinnier version of Bobby staring at me.
I ask, “Where are we, Bobby?”
“Don’t be stupid,” he says, shoving my shoulder as he brushes by
me into the house.
“I don’t get it,” I say, mostly to myself with Bobby already behind
a closed door to what must be his bedroom.
What happened to our room with the bunkbeds? I love the top
bunk so I can jump down to the floor like Buck Rogers wearing his anti-
gravity belt and floating to earth. Only I don’t float and just hit the floor
with a thud.
Confused, I stare across the street at the forest again.
“What happened to our neighborhood in Springfield Gardens
near the Long Island Railroad?” I say aloud, though no one is there to
answer. “Is this the house in New Jersey Mom and Dad were having
built for our future?”
Bobby swings open his bedroom door and stomps toward me.
“Hey, dopey!” he says, pushing me till I fall back on the living
room sofa. “You’re gonna get a lickin’ from Dad tonight. Mom’s gonna
tell him you stole his matches and set the empty lot on fire on Valley
Road across from Busch’s Insurance Agency.”
“I-I didn’t do it,” I stammer. “I-I don’t know what you’re talkin’
about, Bobby.”
“Yes you do,” he says. “That smart girl from your class, Joanie
Berkowitz, she told the Oakland librarian, and she told Mom. Boy, are
you gonna get it when Dad comes home.”
Laughing, Bobby returns to his room and shuts the door. I want
to run to my room, but I don’t know where it is. Nothing is the same as
it was five minutes ago, but . . . I go to the front door and see that I’m
the same height that the line indicates on the molding:
___________ 4’ 7” Gerry June 1954.
I’ve lost five years of my future in five minutes.
I look up the street and see Mom driving a new car, a two-tone
Chevy, forest green on the body and cream colored on the roof. Wow!
When she pulls into the driveway, I see on the fender that it’s a “Bel Air”
model. Never heard of it. Hey! When did Mom get her driver’s license?
Uh-oh, who’s that getting out of the passenger seat? Oh, no.
She must be the librarian. Who’s the girl getting out of the backseat?
She’s wearing glasses and she looks so prim and proper. Probably smart,
too. She must be the tattle-tail. I gotta hide, but where can I go?
I run into the living room and watch them from the window
as they come up the walk toward the front door. I lock the latch and
look left and right. Nowhere to hide . . . except—the sofa. I figure my
growth over the past five years could keep me from squeezing behind
the seat cushions, but the sofa swallows me like the giant anaconda
we saw in that Frank Buck movie about the Amazon, Bring ’em Back Alive.
I peek out where a thin streak of daylight lets me see Mom, the
librarian, and Miss Goodie Two Shoes coming through the front door.
“Gerald!” Mom calls out. “Come here this instant!”
When she calls me “Gerald” I know I’m in trouble. I hear Bobby
open his bedroom door and say, “He’s here, Mom. I told him you knew
about the fire. He’s probably hiding somewhere—maybe in the tree
house we built in the woods across the street.”
“Go get him, Bobby,” Mom said. “Bring him home to face the music.”
Face the music? That sounds like something a priest would say to
James Cagney in a gangster movie. I don’t even know how to strike a match.
I’m be afraid I’ll burn my fingers.
I hear Bobby go out the front door to find me. From between the
cushions, I see Mom, the librarian, and the young girl all pacing.
“Please, have a seat,” Mom says. “I hope you’re wrong, Joanie
Because, if Gerry is the boy you saw light the fire, his father will spank
him with his belt tonight.”
“And rightly so,” the librarian said, as her rump plunks down
on my leg beneath the cushions.
“I’m pretty sure it was him,” Joanie says.
“You’d better be certain,” Mom warned her.
I think, Beyond a reasonable doubt.
The front door opens. Bobby enters and says, “I dunno, Mom.
I thought sure he’d be in the tree house. Maybe he’s hiding at Joey
Amidon’s house.”
“Please, Bobby, go look for him there.”
“Jeez, Mom, I—”
“Now!”
Bobby leaves, and Mom turns to the librarian.
“Would you care for coffee, Miss Henderson?” Mom asks.
“Yes. Thank you,” she says.
“How about a cookie for you, Joanie?”
“I’m not permitted to eat any sweets before dinner,” Joanie responds.
Figures. No sweets for the prune-faced toady. Nya-ya! Nya-ya-ya.
With Mom in the kitchen, Miss Henderson turns to Joanie and says,
“Don’t worry. I’m sure Gerald is the one you saw light the fire.”
“I didn’t actually see him light it. I just saw him holding the matches.”
“That’s enough for me,” Miss Henderson says.
Ugh! I feel like grabbing the two of them by their necks. I want to pull
them both down into my dark cave. But it’s getting late and Dad will be coming
off the train and walking home. Instead of bringing me and Bobby hot, soft
pretzels from New York City, I’ll get my fanny whipped with his belt and sent
to bed without any supper. It won’t matter to anyone that I’m innocent. They
just want to blame someone for the fire.
Who’d ever believe my story about the sofa? I’m ten years old and
forget how I got here. I’m still thinking like a kindergarten baby—stick your
head in gravy. I try not to cry, but fear gets the best of me. As my tears flow,
the light between the cushions goes out, and Mom’s voice as she brings the
coffee into the living room begins to muffle until there’s nothing but silence.
From all the excitement, I’m so tired and doze off. I hope I won’t snore and
give away my hiding place where Bobby can’t find me . . .
A dog’s barking wakes me. I peek out from my comfy hiding place
in the sofa, and find myself nose to nose with a dog’s wet snout. We both
pull our heads back and sneeze. Then the dog barks and growls until I
emerge. He seems to recognize me, but I don’t recognize myself in the
mirror behind the sofa. I rub the dog behind its ears and see a tin license
on its choke-chain collar that says:
My name is IMPY. Please call my owner at Oakland 8-7436.
“You seem to know me, Impy,” I say to the dog. “But what the
heck is happening to me?”
Impy cocks his head back and forth then jumps into my arms. I
turn to the mirror and think I’m looking at someone else. I hold Impy in
one arm and brushed back my hair with my free hand.
“Jeez, Impy, is it already Halloween?” I ask, because my weird
haircut is flat on top like a crewcut, but long on the sides and combed
back to the base of my neck like a vortex. I tell Impy. “Hmm. Looks like
a duck’s ass.”
From his panting, tongue-slurping expression, Impy seems to agree.
I hear a car pull up in the driveway and figure it’s Mom, but it’s Bobby.
I figure Dad will have a fit if his thirteen-year-old son drives his car, but
when Bobby gets out of the rusty Chevy Bel Air, he looks like a senior in
high school with his varsity sweater. Jeez—who’s that good looking--
more than a girl—she’s practically a woman with that figure.
I’m so shocked I can’t move and stand like a statue in the living
room as Bobby and his girlfriend come through the front door.
“Hey, fart breath!” Bobby says to me. “Mom won’t be home from
work till six o’clock. Meantime, Joyce and I have some studying to do for
an exam tomorrow.”
I stammer, “S-studying? Exam?”
“That’s what you’re gonna tell Mom if she finds out Joyce came
over after school.”
“I am?”
“Hey dip-shit! That’s what you’re gonna say if she asks. If she
doesn’t ask, she doesn’t know. Then you don’t say diddly.”
I stare blankly at Bobby but my eyes keep wandering toward
Joyce with the big--
“Hey dork!” Bobby shouts. “Are you gonna be a problem?”
“Oh, come on, Bobby,” Joyce says. “Leave him alone. I think
he’s kinda cute. You want me to give you French kiss, too, little brother?”
“What’s that?” I ask.
“Come here and I’ll show you,” she says, swiping her tongue
across her upper lip.
“No she won’t,” Bobby says, pushing her into his bedroom. “Go
take Impy for a long walk. Really long. What you don’t see, you can’t tell
Mom about. Go on. Get lost with your dog.”
Bobby closes his bedroom door behind him and I hear Joyce laugh.
Jeez, she smells good, like Christmas cookies and Easter candy all wrapped
into one package. Happy Holidays!
“Come on, Impy. Let’s take a walk,” I say, seeing a leash hanging on
a hook near the front door.
Impy seems to know what “walk” means, because he chases his tail
in circles and jumps around like he’s an act on The Ed Sullivan Show. Just
as we’re ready to go out the front door, another car pulls in the driveway
behind the Bel Air. I pull Impy back from the door by his leash and look
out the front bay window. Uh-oh. It’s Mom, looking a bit grey around her
ears where her short hairdo makes her look so much older than the last
time I saw her.
Wanting his walk, Impy barks.
Bobby shouts through his closed bedroom door, “Get going,
dumb ass!”
Joyce laughs and shouts, “Come and get your French kiss!”
Mom’s footsteps clunk up the wooden porch steps.
“Come on, Impy,” I say, shoving my squirming dog between the
cushions of the sofa and following right behind him.
Impy barks only once with the sound of the front door closing
behind Mom.
I hear her shout, “Gerry! Bobby! I’m home early.”
I know I won’t hear any response from Bobby, but I laugh to
myself, imagining the expressions on Bobby’s and Joyce’s faces with
the sound of Mom’s voice.
“Impy?” I whisper. When I pull on the leash, it gives me no
resistance. The choke-chain is empty. I anticipate no response as
I repeat, “Impy . . .” then with exhaustion, I doze off . . .
I stir from the sound of laughter. I don’t see anyone in the
living room, though the narrow space between the sofa’s cushion
isn’t much of a panorama. Cautiously, I slip out from the sofa. I’m still
holding the dog leash and empty collar. I set them aside and go to
the kitchen from where the laughter is coming. At the center island
two tall guys look vaguely familiar.
“Come on, Gerry. Have another beer to bring in the New
Year!” the tallest one says.
The other guy says, “Tommy and I were recalling the time
we’d set the field on fire. There was poison sumac in that empty lot
and the smoke drifted over to the Amidon’s house. Joey’s mom
inhaled the smoke and got poison sumac in her lungs.”
“Yeah, Nick, but we had no idea. We were just screwin’
around with matches and it got out of control.”
Nick says, “I can’t believe Joanie Berkowitz squealed on us.”
Recognizing my two best friends from grammar school and
high school, I add, “Yeah, but she told Miss Henderson the librarian
that I did it. I got a lickin’ from my dad that night for setting the fire
and I knew nothing about it. That was you guys?”
“Not just us. Gary Meredith was there. He brought the matches.”
“Crazy Gary?” I ask. “Jeez, our football coach used to get the
two of us mixed up. He thought we were twins.”
Tommy says. “The next year he got expelled for taking a dump
on Mrs. Prosky’s desk before she arrived for class.”
“Where was Joanie Baloney for that one?” Nick says. “I wasn’t
allowed to have any ice cream all summer because of that snitch. Ice
cream was more important to me than girls when I was that age.”
“Now that we’re twenty-one, you can keep the ice cream and
pass the beer,” Tommy says raising a can of Bud, which Nick and I click
with ours.
I remember when Dad gave me a taste of his beer when I
was fifteen. I thought it was bitter, but now . . . hmm, it’s good.
The three of us go into the living room and plunk down on the
sofa with its autumnal leaf pattern now faded with age. We watch as
the ball comes down bringing in the New Year. We toast our shared
age of twenty-one. Nick and I are juniors in college and Tom is on
leave from the U.S. Navy. Tommy feels lucky to be stationed in
Hawaii, thousands of miles from home, but also thousands of miles
from Southeast Asia where the war in Vietnam is percolating daily.
Nick is a sole-surviving son and can’t be drafted, and I’m in ROTC at
college with Basic Training a year away before my commission as a
2nd Louie.
“Hey, guys! Lemme show you what I learned in college,” Nick
says. “Tommy, you’re the only one who smokes. Gimme a match.”
Tommy reaches into his breast pocket and tosses him a book
of matches. Nick shifts his butt to the edge of the sofa’s seat cushion
and lets out a long, loud fart as he strikes a match and puts it to his
butt. A two-foot flame shoots out from between his legs as he shrieks.
“Holy crap!” Tommy shouts. “Is that for real?”
“Gotta be a trick,” I challenge.
“Gosh, I’m sorry, Gerry,” Nick says. “I singed your folks’ sofa.”
“Then it’s not a trick?” Tommy says, taking the matches from
Nick and putting them back in his pocket. “You really had flames
shooting out your ass?”
Nick says, “A guy in my dorm did it naked and had to go to
the infirmary to get his anus treated for burns.”
“Jeez, Nick,” I say. “My mom’s gonna have a fit when she
sees that burnt cushion.”
Nick stands, flips the cushion over, and says, “Good as new.”
“Only until next June when she puts the slipcovers over it.”
I say.
“That’s six months from now,” Tom says.
“Not long enough to fool my mom,” I say. “That’s why my
brother and I call her ‘The General.’”
“I know what you mean,” Tom agrees. “My mom’s ‘The Admiral.’”
Nick shrugs. “My mom would say, ‘It’s just furniture. As long as
my Nicky isn’t burnt, doesn’t matter.”
Tom and I exchange glances and shake our heads over Mama’s
Boy shooting flames from his ass. Then through the bay window we see
headlights flash from the driveway.
“My folks are back from their New Year’s party,” I say.
“I gotta use the bathroom,” Tom says.
“I better go home,” Nick says. “My mom will be worried if I’m not
home by one o’clock.”
Tom closes the bathroom door behind him, and Nick goes out the
back door.
I turn over the edge of the sofa’s center cushion and see the burnt
fabric. On the side table there’s a framed photo of Bobby in a tuxedo with
a pretty girl in a white wedding dress. It isn’t Joyce, so I wonder if there
could still be a French kiss out there somewhere waiting just for me. I hear
my parents coming up the porch steps. Mom is nagging Dad about something
he did at the party. I hope he didn’t light a fart. Fads like that can get out of
control. Someone might even try it in church.
As they open the front door, I hear Mom say, “What’s that? I smell
something burning. Becoming instinctive to my survival, I dive beneath the
burnt sofa cushion, losing a shoe in the process. In the darkness, I limp
with only one shoe on until I stumble and fall. My limbs feel weighted
by the rapid passage of time until I lose consciousness . . .
I’m awakened by the pounding on the cushions above me and the
shrieks of children’s high pitched laughter. It sounds like they’re playing a
game, a little boy and his older sister. They can’t be more than five and ten.
I see I’m right. From between the cushions I see a girl a foot-and-a-half taller
than the boy. Both have familiar facial features similar to mine.
“Calm down, Jeremy, or I’m telling Dad,” the girl says.
“Up your nose with a rubber hose, Kim,” the boy says.
Something he’d heard on TV, I imagine. Hopefully not in kindergarten.
“Don’t be such a little monster,” Kim says.
“You’re the monster,” Jeremy retorts, his body contorting and his words
in rapid fire. “Monster! Monster! Cookie Monster!”
I figure they must be my monsters.
“Hey, Daddy!” Jeremy shouts, staring right at me. “Watcha doin’ under
the pillows?”
I didn’t think they can see me, but I suppose Jeremy can because he
hasn’t been in school all that long and his imagination is unencumbered by
the laws of physics and nature. At ten, Kim is borderline. She’s just stopped
believing in Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny, but her teen hormones are
still on the distant horizon so her imagination isn’t totally void. Maybe she’ll
keep some of her imagination, enough to use as an adult. There’s no doubt
about Jeremy; artistically he’s already off the charts, a whirling dervish of
creativity ready to explode with lyrics and music born in his head.
They take a step back from me as I emerge from between the
sofa’s cushions.
“Mom’s at church rehearsing for choir,” Kim says.
“She won’t be home for hours, Daddy,” Jeremy says with a gremlin’s grin.
They each have their hands behind their backs concealing something.
“We wanna play, Dad,” Kim says with hazel eyes the size of saucers.
“Yeah, Daddy.” Jeremy says. “We wanna play!”
With my mind still at age five like Jeremy, I feel my body trembling like
a young colt ready to burst from the barn into an open field for my first gallop.
“Okay, kids,” I ask them. “What do you want to play?”
They turn to give each other a nod. Behind them, they hold a throw
pillow from the sofa in each hand. They shout in harmony, “Let’s play pies!”
They bombard me with pillows, knocking me back onto the sofa. They
pound me in the head with the pillows, shouting, “Pie fight!”
Quixotic rapture engulfs me as their arms, like windmills, pummel my
face with the soft pillows. At first, all my efforts are just to protect my face by
blocking their relentless blows. We groveled on the sofa, but their joined scents
of sweat soap and baby oil after their showers overcomes me like a narcotic.
My arms hug them around their waists and pull them close until I’m
kissing them both and I feel like I’m falling from a great height.
“Love you, Dad,” Kim says, her soft cheek next to mine, rough from
not shaving since morning.
“I love you ten bucks a million, Daddy,” Jeremy says, kissing my ear
with a loud smack.
A single stitch joining the delicate fabric of time makes me feel as if
we’re of one spirit. I hold them both so tight, never wanting to surrender
this precious moment. There were loves left behind in the void, but none
so intense as the bloodline of children. Once experiencing the love of your
children, you can never assess the value of your parents the same way
ever again.
“Take me with you, Dad,” Kim says as if she instinctively knows I’m
leaving.
“Me, too, Daddy,” Jeremy says. “Don’t go.”
I want so much to take them with me, but I don’t have that right.
They have their own timelines to follow. Falling back beneath the cushions,
I refrain at the last second, but then release them. I drift back into the
temporary black void of transcendence . . .
It’s the heat and brightness of the sun that disturbs my contemplation.
A putrid stench flares in my nostrils as I open my eyes to see I’m on a screen
porch and lying on the old sofa that had been my parents’, was a hand-me-
down for my first house when I got married, and made the long trip from New
Jersey to Florida where I retired almost twenty years ago. There must have
been some magic in those slipcovers my mom made to have lasted seventy
years.
There’s a framed photo of my wife on a side table. An old woman
with white hair, but with a sparkle in her eyes. I wish I hadn’t outlived her.
The last of my medicinal marijuana lies on the glass coffee table beside the
hospice morphine dose in case the weed doesn’t make me forget I’m on
my final farewell tour.
Spanish moss sways like grey Havishamian locks from the trees along
the pond’s banks where “Wally” gator basks in the Florida sun as if he’s waiting
for me to make my move.
“Yes, it’s time,” I tell Wally. “I’m done.”
I recline, stretching the length of the old three-cushioned sofa and roll
toward the gap between the back and seat cushions. The old sofa swallows me.
I hear my breathing and my pulse and wait until I become so bored I try to find
my way back out. Groping for anything to hold onto, I feel something in the
palm of my hand. Is it what it feels like?
“Yes,” I say, taking the matchbook in both hands then striking a match
to light the void. I find my direction and follow the thin line of horizontal light
between the cushions.
I hear my brother Bobby’s voice calling me back.
“Okay. I give up! You win,” Bobby says with resolve. “Come out! Come out!
Wherever you are!”
I’m so glad to hear his voice again, so I peek out to see him. He looks no
more than eight years old, so I must be only five.
“Boo!” I shout, lunging at him from between the cushions. I grab him and
we wrestle onto the floor.
“Hey! That’s a cool hiding place,” Bobby says, pushing his arm between
the cushions. “It’s like a cave, a secret lair where goblins hide.”
I do the same with one arm still holding the matchbook in that hand. I let
go of it and withdraw my empty hand. I figure my life might be different if I make
better choices. I try to stop him, but before I can, Bobby’s feet disappear between
the cushions . . .
Perhaps we will cross paths again—all of us . . .
Pablo’s Discoteca
by
Geraldo Arturo Invierno
Instinctively, Dykstra took one last look over his shoulder before entering
Pablo’s Discoteca on the southern-most block of Spanish Harlem off Manhattan’s
96th Street. The thumping beat of the jukebox and the tacky glitter of year-round
Christmas decorations flashing around the long bar were familiar to the under
cover DEA agent, but as he gazed about the large single room to find his long-time
friend and crucial contact, he sensed that things had changed, subtly perhaps, but
irreparably. It was the early 80’s when no one who was living the dream at the time
ever realized until the millennium, that these had been “the good ole days.”
Much like the varicolored tropical fish in many tanks behind the bar, Dykstra
felt as if he were also on display. Not just because of his six-six 250 pound stature
standing more than a head above everyone else in the noisy club, he was a misfit,
an intruder from the past into the flashy world of a new generation of desperados.
Pablo’s clientele had always been a mixed bag and tonight was no different.
There were tuxedoed gentlemen and sleek, high cheek-boned models wearing
diamonds at the larger tables. All their eyes seemed to follow him as he ambled
to the bar. There were the slumming VIPs often insecure about their own relevance
who’d be muttering amongst themselves, “He must be somebody . . . do you know
who he is?”
“Modelo,” Dykstra told the bartender. He chugged the first bottle then ordered
another cerveza.
“Is Pablo in back?” he asked the veteran bartender. Dykstra had watched him
turn grey over the years.
A man in his thirties with dirty-blond, shoulder-length hair and a beard and
moustache to match turned on his stool at the far end of the bar. He wore a burgundy
velvet blazer with a custom-fit, sky-blue, silk shirt open at the neck, revealing a heavy
gold chain nestled in his thick chest hair. His light-grey slacks bulged at his muscular
thighs and calves as he swiveled on the barstool and came toward Dykstra with an
extended hand.
“Great to see you Dykes,” the younger man said, his smaller hand still giving
Dykstra’s enormous mitt equally crushing strength.
“Glad you could make it, Stark,” Dykstra said, scanning the crowd with more
filtering in from the street since he’d entered Pablo’s. “Place isn’t the same.”
“What is these days?” Stark said with a shrug.
“We used to be able to talk right here at the bar. Doesn’t feel safe now.”
“Tell me about it,” Stark said with a smirk. “C’mon. Pablo set up a private table
for us in back. It’ll be OK back there. But before we head back, I need a minute to empty
this wise guy’s bankroll with his baseball trivia challenge.”
“You still doin’ that shit?”
Stark shrugged. “What the hell. He wants to part with his wad.”
“Wise guy, huh? So the mob still hangs out here with the cops?”
“A lot of deals go down at Pablo’s, traded information that’s valuable to both
sides. The mayor has a slush fund just to cover all our tips.”
“Jeez. New York.”
“Gotta love it, Dykes.” Stark turned to the man seated behind him. “OK, it’s
double or nothing, right?”
The mobster said, “OK, Mistah cumputah head, what was Ted Williams’s
battin’ average and how many homahs did he hit in his final season, and what was
the yea’?”
“How can I be sure you know the right answers, Rocco?” Stark challenged.
“Quitcha bluffin’, Stark. I came from Boston and was at that game.”
Stark rattled off, “It was 1960 and “The Splendid Splinter” hit 29 homers and
batted .316. It was homer number 521.”
“Jeez! Why do I bother?” Rocco said. “Tell ya what. I’ll bet ya a grand you can’t
tell me what I was wearing at the game.”
Dykstra cut in. “What kind a bet is that?”
“He’s already taken me for fifteen hundred. Gimme a break, Stark.”
“I’m giving you a break by not taking your bet,” Stark said with confidence.
“C’mon, let’s make it two grand,” Rocco said.
“You wore a vertically-striped shirt with a button-down collar and tan chinos with
pointy-toed, paten-leather shoes, and a Bosox cap.”
“Madone! You’ve wiped me clean,” Rocco groaned.” How could you know?”
“A lucky guess, but that’s what everyone wore then, only you guys wore the
pointy shoes. The Bosox cap was a gimme. Until you told me, I never knew you came
from Boston.”
Dykstra had a rare laugh. “Are you for real, Stark?”
Stark said aside, “Rocco forgot he showed me a photo three years ago of him
and Williams. It was autographed to him, so I figured it was from that same day we
were betting on. No guess work at all. Right there in black and white.”
“Even so, you still had to remember all that from three years ago,” Dykstra said.
Stark just grinned with a shrug, for that was his gift and just one of the many
reasons they needed to talk.
As they stood from their barstools, a small, boney man in his sixties came
through the swinging kitchen doors beyond the bar. He was drying his hands with
a red-and-white-checkered towel. His white apron was stained red with salsa. He’d
wiped the sauce off his hands in preparing his signature recipe, so spicy the salsa
could blow a hole through the back of your head like a mob hit.
For Pablo’s regulars who thrived on his unique preparation, he’d sometimes
prepare it days ahead to let it marinate to perfection. Stark had called a week ago to let
him know that he and an old friend would be coming tonight.
Pablo squinted as he approached them then threw the towel over his shoulder
and scratched his scrubby chin.
“Mon Dios! Dykes is it you? Pablo said. “I thought you retired.”
“Hey, Pablo. Long time no see,” Dykstra gave him a bear hug.
“C’mon guys. I got that quiet corner for you all set up.” He winked at Stark.
“I thought Stark was gonna bring some nueva amante tonight and waste my efforts
with the salsa on some delicate creature with a sensitive stomach. Tonight’s salsa
may require a new colon by sunrise, but I’m sure you two can handle it.”
As Pablo led them to the rear of the club, their images were reflected in the
varnished metallic ceiling ten feet above.
“Sorry about the place, Dykes,” Pablo said as they were seated. “Ever since this
TV chica gave us a three-star rating, it’s been a boom. But the ambiance has changed
with a high-end crowd.”
“As long as the salsa and the music hold up, no problem,” Stark said. “I was here
last week and it was great.”
“Two more Modelos,” Dykstra said.
“Comin’ up,” Pablo said, leaving them to discuss their private business.
They waited till their beers came with the salsa and nachos so their conversation
wouldn’t be interrupted. They each dipped into the salsa, exchanged challenging stares,
and crunched into their nachos laced with molten red salsa. Their eyes flared, they
swallowed, then each took a long swig from his bottle of beer. Dykstra broke into a
sweat first, but Stark’s long hair became quickly matted by the internal heat. They
exchanged nods and repeated the ritual with the assurance that Pablo’s salsa was
still the best.
“You know I’m eligible for retirement,” Dykstra said. “So I sure as hell didn’t go
looking for this case. It was dumped on my doorstep, but I need your expertise.”
“You’ve got plenty of good people at the agency. Why me, Dykes.”
“You’ve met Thaddeus Horne and know a lot about him that the public doesn’t.
He’s under our surveillance, but as former CIA, he has top security clearance and could
get wind of our presence through all his wealth and connections.”
“Where’s this heading?” Stark asked.
“He’s heavily vested in cangrejos grandes, genetically enhanced jumbo shrimp,
in Ecuador. We think it’s a front, laundering money to finance a coup to take over the
Ecuadorian government.”
“Who’s we?”
Dykstra hedged, embarrassed to admit, “Just me and my informant.”
“Who’s he?”
“She, Malicia Fajardo. We both saw Horne’s people in Ecuador murder her
father.”
“Sounds too personal for her.”
“That’s why I’m here, Stark. I want you to work with her.”
“I work alone.”
“You need to make an exception. She has too much information and inside
connections in Ecuador to ignore their value, some are already deeply entrenched
in Horne’s full-blown operation.
“OK. We’ve got our team—you, me and this Fajardo woman. We follow the
money, and the bodies if any more than her father’s accumulate, but to what end?”
“There‘s an abundance of an untapped natural resource in Ecuador that could
change energy production for the foreseeable future. Horne wants a monopoly on that
resource. If you own the country, you own the world’s future energy supply.”
“Sounds like a down shift in the world order, Dykes. Can’t let that happen.”
“I knew you’d see it my way.”
“When do I meet Malicia?” Stark asked.
“She prefers to be called ‘Mali’ because when we were in the field together
it took too long to say, ‘Malicia, duck!’ She’ll contact you, probably when you least
expect. I gotta go, but I’ll be in touch after you and Mali connect. It’ll be sooner rather
than later.”
“I’m leaving too,” Stark said, but Pablo came to the table excitedly before
Stark even stood to leave.
“Before you go, Stark, would you mind? I got a wager going with one of those
high-rollers at the big tables.”
“Baseball again?”
“No-no, Stark, it’s the other thing.”
“OK, Pablo, for ole time’s sake, since Dykes showed up. But you don’t want to
turn your place into a circus. You’ll scare away all the informants.”
Dykstra had seen this display of strength and balance more than a dozen times,
so he just shook his head and left the club.
Stark proceeded to lie face down in the middle of the club’s hardwood dance
floor. Pablo’s Discoteca was at full capacity with the late night crowd of over two
hundred patrons. The regulars shushed first-timers, bringing the club to a sudden
hush.
With a jerk, Stark raised his mid-section so that only his extended fingertips
and bent toes touched the floor. His back remained straight with no arch.
Pablo had one of his waiters lend him a hand for support as he stood up on
Stark’s back like a surfer on his board. The crowd counted loudly and got to thirty
before Pablo lost his balance and tumbled to the floor.
“OK, who’s next?” Pablo shouted over the applause and whistles from the
crowd. “If you fall off his back before his stomach touches the floor, you owe the
house a hundred bucks! If he touches his stomach to the floor first, you get a crisp
new Franklin from the register.” He shrugged. “Hey it’s a business tax right-off for
me”.
Stark lowered himself to the floor waiting for challengers.
“Who’ll try it?” Pablo shouted like a circus barker. “Spectators may place their
bets of one hundred dollars either for or against Mr. Stark. You could double your
money, folks!”
Pablo’s eager patrons gathered around closer as Stark went back into his
rigid out-stretched position on the floor. Amazed that Stark could hold that pose
for even a moment without anyone on his back, the cash quickly flowed into Pablo’s
stained apron’s pouch.
“We’re still fifty-fifty on this, right Pablo?” Stark asked.
“Of course,” Pablo confirmed. “Why bother without that incentive? Then again,
you’re just crazy enough to do it for fun.”
“I’m seeing forty on the horizon, so it’s not as much fun as it used to be,”
Stark admitted. “Longer recovery time.”
Stark heard a deep, throaty voice above him. but couldn’t turn to see who it was.
“I would like to try it,” the woman said with a subtle accent.
From his position on the floor, Stark turned his head to see long, slender legs
which seemed to rise endlessly to the hem of her ruffled, black tunic, sheer and three-
quarters up her firm thighs. She glared down at him with wide eyes, ink-black with
a thermal glow of unspoken passion. Her skin was very dark, with sculptured facial
features, which Stark recognized as Serrano from his times in Quito.
She removed a wooden comb from her straight, black, glossy hair and shook
its shoulder-length folds loose. Her teeth were straight and flashed when she smiled
like sharp cutlery against her dark face. Her lip gloss drew attention to her most
attractive feature, full lips with a natural earth-tone hue that seemed to whisper a
promised seduction.
“Winner take all!” she shouted with her bright teeth flashing like a piranha’s.
Two thousand dollars was bet against Stark.
“What’s your bet?” Pablo asked her.
“I have no cash, but I expect to win. Will he accept me as collateral?”
Pablo looked down at Stark for his approval.
“What the hell,” Stark said, but had a shot of Stoli set on the floor which he
took in his teeth and drank as a show of confidence to demoralize his opponent.
When Pablo offered her his hand to help her balance as she got onto
Stark’s back, she declined.
“Thank you, but I’ll manage,” she said.
“But those heels,” Pablo said. “You’ll never balance with those shoes on.”
“Is that a rule?” she asked.
Pablo stammered, “Well, no, but—”
“Let ’er where them,” Stark said. “They’ll be her problem, not mine.”
With that, the woman stepped right onto Starks’ back. She held out her arms
gracefully, moving from Stark’s buttocks to his shoulders. She spun completely around
several times with the precision of an Olympic balance beam champion. Her audience
cheered and sighed with each turn.
“Now, I’ve made my show of it and had my fun,” she said to Stark as she dug
her stiletto heels sharply into his spine.”
The salsa beat from the jukebox keyed her cadence with each step.
“Like a great matador, I’ll bring down this bull quickly and cleanly,” she
proclaimed, working the pressure points between his shoulder blades then the lumbar
region where there was the greatest stress of bearing her weight as well as his own.
“Jeez!” Stark groaned, teeth clenched in a grimace and his furrowed brow
glistening with sweat.
“Come on, Stark-baby!” Pablo shouted. “Lots a bread on this one.”
It became a battle of the sexes with most women cheering for the woman and
the men rooting for Stark.
“Are those heels made of steel?” Stark growled in pain.
“Only wood,” she said casually, “but the hardest wood there is, Guayacan,
my fine bull.” She balanced on one foot, dangling the other flamboyantly, the sharp
stiletto heel readied like a sword to bring him down. “Are you prepared to fall and
become my trophy?”
Stark looked to the side where he saw her reflection in the mirror behind the bar.
Feeling near defeat, he watch in the mirror for her strike. He concentrated on her single
heel cutting between his two vertebrae.
With a sudden shift of her weight, he put all of his strength in his right arm to
balance his weight and maintain his position, but slashed out with his left arm behind
him to grab her ankle. With a jerk, he toppled her like a rag doll to the floor but returned
his arm to its former position without his stomach touching the floor.
The crowd went wild and threw more cash at Stark for his grand show of
strength. He lowered himself to the floor then stood with a raised fist to acknowledge his
victory. With applause, the patrons backed away toward their tables around the dance
floor and revealed the woman on her knees and stlll hanging her head in defeat.
Pablo jumped up and down to the salsa beat from the jukebox and shouted to
Stark, “Don’t talk to me about Pablo’s turning into a circus, amigo. You’re my star
clown in the center ring!”
Stark extended a hand to the raven-haired beauty on the floor then began to
tap his foot to the salsa beat. Then he bobbed his head to the beat and she did the
same as he pulled her off the floor and into his embrace. She leaned into him with
one leg pointed behind her and her back arched with her breasts thrust forward. He
spun her and stepped behind her then reached for her hand behind him as if he’d
always known where it would be. He spun her back in front of him and felt her warmth
and her hot breath at his neck moist with sweat. For the next two minutes they moved
across the dance floor as if they owned it, with no false steps or missed beats. They
seemed weightless to the crowd observing them as well as to themselves. Each time
he spun her away from him, he had to have her again, and pulled her effortlessly back
into his embrace. When the music stopped, both stood facing each other panting like
dogs on an sweltering August afternoon.
Stark broke the silence. “You play rough,” he said.
“I can also place nice . . . very nice. You want to play with me, toro?”
He hesitated in silence.
She shrugged. “I Guess I don’t play rough enough for a man such as you.
I didn’t believe I could lose the bet. Perhaps I’m not an ample prize for such a
clever hombre.”
“Someone who looks like you in a place like this can’t be alone. Where’s
your date?”
“Oh, he left a while ago. So if you want to collect your collateral, I’m all
yours tonight.”
He nodded and led her to the private table in back that had been reserved for
him and Dykstra. He ordered a Campari on the rocks with a lime twist for her and a
Stoli on the rocks for himself. Off the dancefloor and under an overhead light at the
table he saw not just her beauty but a sinuous strength that held her together like a
steel trap. Her dark eyes seemed to be sizing him up as well, and from her dimpled
smile, favorably. They clicked their glasses with cheers. Hers, “salud!” His, astrovia!
“To us,” she added, and he liked the sound of it . . . us . . . there hadn’t been an
us for Stark for some time.
“Tell me then,” she said. “How do you manage to remain rigid for so long?”
Of course she meant the contest, but his boyishness made him return her
quip with one of his own. “I’ve had many hours of rigid training.”
She rolled her dark eyes and said, “Hmm, I see . . . we’ve danced, groveled
on the floor, and splashed each other with our sweat in the process tonight, but we
haven’t even been introduced.”
“Sorry. I’m Jeremy Stark. Pablo and my longtime associates just call me Stark.”
“What do your closest friends and family call you?” she asked.
“Jem.”
“That sounds too cute and cuddly for a tough guy like you.”
“It’s a homonym that’s stuck. My mom said I was a diamond in the rough as
an adolescent. My sisters said, ‘Yeah, he’s a real gem already. Thus Jem for Jeremy.”
Her laugh was disarming and made him feel like the cuddly misnomer he’d
been dubbed prematurely. There was something odd about how he felt toward her,
but he couldn’t place it yet. He knew he would eventually. It was his business to
evaluate people. Sometimes that could make the difference between life and death.
His or theirs. Not much difference in the mix.
He felt she was studying his face the same way, so he extended his hand
to hers across the table and felt its smooth warmth in contrast to his own, rough
and cold.
“And you are?” he asked.
“Ah, and here I thought you surely had the drop me, Jem. It’s a pleasure to
meet you. Just call me Mali.”
The candle’s flame on their table flickered in her eyes like two belly-dancers
gyrating to the salsa beat reverberating from the distant dancefloor. He stood and
pulled from her chair to her feet until the top of her head rested beneath his beard.
“Dance, Mali?” he asked and felt her head nod against his chin.
So their dance began, neither certain for how long, but both wondering if
there would be an end to the music even if their feet remained in motion.
______________
The Happy Prince
From The Happy Prince and Other Tales (1888)
By Oscar Wilde
High above the city, on a tall column, stood the statue of the Happy Prince. He was gilded all over with thin leaves of fine gold, for eyes he had two bright sapphires, and a large red ruby glowed on his sword-hilt.
He was very much admired indeed. "He is as beautiful as a weathercock," remarked one of the Town Councillors who wished to gain a reputation for having artistic tastes; "only not quite so useful," he added, fearing lest people should think him unpractical, which he really was not.
"Why can't you be like the Happy Prince?" asked a sensible mother of her little boy who was crying for the moon. "The Happy Prince never dreams of crying for anything."
"I am glad there is some one in the world who is quite happy," muttered a disappointed man as he gazed at the wonderful statue.
"He looks just like an angel," said the Charity Children as they came out of the cathedral in their bright scarlet cloaks and their clean white pinafores.
"How do you know?" said the Mathematical Master, "you have never seen one."
"Ah! but we have, in our dreams," answered the children; and the Mathematical Master frowned and looked very severe, for he did not approve of children dreaming.
One night there flew over the city a little Swallow. His friends had gone away to Egypt six weeks before, but he had stayed behind, for he was in love with the most beautiful Reed. He had met her early in the spring as he was flying down the river after a big yellow moth, and had been so attracted by her slender waist that he had stopped to talk to her.
"Shall I love you?" said the Swallow, who liked to come to the point at once, and the Reed made him a low bow. So he flew round and round her, touching the water with his wings, and making silver ripples. This was his courtship, and it lasted all through the summer.
"It is a ridiculous attachment," twittered the other Swallows; "she has no money, and far too many relations"; and indeed the river was quite full of Reeds. Then, when the autumn came they all flew away.
After they had gone he felt lonely, and began to tire of his lady- love. "She has no conversation," he said, "and I am afraid that she is a coquette, for she is always flirting with the wind." And certainly, whenever the wind blew, the Reed made the most graceful curtseys. "I admit that she is domestic," he continued, "but I love travelling, and my wife, consequently, should love travelling also."
"Will you come away with me?" he said finally to her; but the Reed shook her head, she was so attached to her home.
"You have been trifling with me," he cried. "I am off to the Pyramids. Good-bye!" and he flew away.
All day long he flew, and at night-time he arrived at the city. "Where shall I put up?" he said; "I hope the town has made preparations."
Then he saw the statue on the tall column.
"I will put up there," he cried; "it is a fine position, with plenty of fresh air." So he alighted just between the feet of the Happy Prince.
"I have a golden bedroom," he said softly to himself as he looked round, and he prepared to go to sleep; but just as he was putting his head under his wing a large drop of water fell on him. "What a curious thing!" he cried; "there is not a single cloud in the sky, the stars are quite clear and bright, and yet it is raining. The climate in the north of Europe is really dreadful. The Reed used to like the rain, but that was merely her selfishness."
Then another drop fell.
"What is the use of a statue if it cannot keep the rain off?" he said; "I must look for a good chimney-pot," and he determined to fly away.
But before he had opened his wings, a third drop fell, and he looked up, and saw - Ah! what did he see?
The eyes of the Happy Prince were filled with tears, and tears were running down his golden cheeks. His face was so beautiful in the moonlight that the little Swallow was filled with pity.
"Who are you?" he said.
"I am the Happy Prince."
"Why are you weeping then?" asked the Swallow; "you have quite drenched me."
"When I was alive and had a human heart," answered the statue, "I did not know what tears were, for I lived in the Palace of Sans- Souci, where sorrow is not allowed to enter. In the daytime I played with my companions in the garden, and in the evening I led the dance in the Great Hall. Round the garden ran a very lofty wall, but I never cared to ask what lay beyond it, everything about me was so beautiful. My courtiers called me the Happy Prince, and happy indeed I was, if pleasure be happiness. So I lived, and so I died. And now that I am dead they have set me up here so high that I can see all the ugliness and all the misery of my city, and though my heart is made of lead yet I cannot chose but weep."
"What! is he not solid gold?" said the Swallow to himself. He was too polite to make any personal remarks out loud.
"Far away," continued the statue in a low musical voice, "far away in a little street there is a poor house. One of the windows is open, and through it I can see a woman seated at a table. Her face is thin and worn, and she has coarse, red hands, all pricked by the needle, for she is a seamstress. She is embroidering passion- flowers on a satin gown for the loveliest of the Queen's maids-of- honour to wear at the next Court-ball. In a bed in the corner of the room her little boy is lying ill. He has a fever, and is asking for oranges. His mother has nothing to give him but river water, so he is crying. Swallow, Swallow, little Swallow, will you not bring her the ruby out of my sword-hilt? My feet are fastened to this pedestal and I cannot move."
"I am waited for in Egypt," said the Swallow. "My friends are flying up and down the Nile, and talking to the large lotus- flowers. Soon they will go to sleep in the tomb of the great King. The King is there himself in his painted coffin. He is wrapped in yellow linen, and embalmed with spices. Round his neck is a chain of pale green jade, and his hands are like withered leaves."
"Swallow, Swallow, little Swallow," said the Prince, "will you not stay with me for one night, and be my messenger? The boy is so thirsty, and the mother so sad."
"I don't think I like boys," answered the Swallow. "Last summer, when I was staying on the river, there were two rude boys, the miller's sons, who were always throwing stones at me. They never hit me, of course; we swallows fly far too well for that, and besides, I come of a family famous for its agility; but still, it was a mark of disrespect."
But the Happy Prince looked so sad that the little Swallow was sorry. "It is very cold here," he said; "but I will stay with you for one night, and be your messenger."
"Thank you, little Swallow," said the Prince.
So the Swallow picked out the great ruby from the Prince's sword, and flew away with it in his beak over the roofs of the town.
He passed by the cathedral tower, where the white marble angels were sculptured. He passed by the palace and heard the sound of dancing. A beautiful girl came out on the balcony with her lover. "How wonderful the stars are," he said to her, "and how wonderful is the power of love!"
"I hope my dress will be ready in time for the State-ball," she answered; "I have ordered passion-flowers to be embroidered on it; but the seamstresses are so lazy."
He passed over the river, and saw the lanterns hanging to the masts of the ships. He passed over the Ghetto, and saw the old Jews bargaining with each other, and weighing out money in copper scales. At last he came to the poor house and looked in. The boy was tossing feverishly on his bed, and the mother had fallen asleep, she was so tired. In he hopped, and laid the great ruby on the table beside the woman's thimble. Then he flew gently round the bed, fanning the boy's forehead with his wings. "How cool I feel," said the boy, "I must be getting better"; and he sank into a delicious slumber.
Then the Swallow flew back to the Happy Prince, and told him what he had done. "It is curious," he remarked, "but I feel quite warm now, although it is so cold."
"That is because you have done a good action," said the Prince. And the little Swallow began to think, and then he fell asleep. Thinking always made him sleepy.
When day broke he flew down to the river and had a bath. "What a remarkable phenomenon," said the Professor of Ornithology as he was passing over the bridge. "A swallow in winter!" And he wrote a long letter about it to the local newspaper. Every one quoted it, it was full of so many words that they could not understand.
"To-night I go to Egypt," said the Swallow, and he was in high spirits at the prospect. He visited all the public monuments, and sat a long time on top of the church steeple. Wherever he went the Sparrows chirruped, and said to each other, "What a distinguished stranger!" so he enjoyed himself very much.
When the moon rose he flew back to the Happy Prince. "Have you any commissions for Egypt?" he cried; "I am just starting."
"Swallow, Swallow, little Swallow," said the Prince, "will you not stay with me one night longer?"
"I am waited for in Egypt," answered the Swallow. "To-morrow my friends will fly up to the Second Cataract. The river-horse couches there among the bulrushes, and on a great granite throne sits the God Memnon. All night long he watches the stars, and when the morning star shines he utters one cry of joy, and then he is silent. At noon the yellow lions come down to the water's edge to drink. They have eyes like green beryls, and their roar is louder than the roar of the cataract.
"Swallow, Swallow, little Swallow," said the Prince, "far away across the city I see a young man in a garret. He is leaning over a desk covered with papers, and in a tumbler by his side there is a bunch of withered violets. His hair is brown and crisp, and his lips are red as a pomegranate, and he has large and dreamy eyes. He is trying to finish a play for the Director of the Theatre, but he is too cold to write any more. There is no fire in the grate, and hunger has made him faint."
"I will wait with you one night longer," said the Swallow, who really had a good heart. "Shall I take him another ruby?"
"Alas! I have no ruby now," said the Prince; "my eyes are all that I have left. They are made of rare sapphires, which were brought out of India a thousand years ago. Pluck out one of them and take it to him. He will sell it to the jeweller, and buy food and firewood, and finish his play."
"Dear Prince," said the Swallow, "I cannot do that"; and he began to weep.
"Swallow, Swallow, little Swallow," said the Prince, "do as I command you."
So the Swallow plucked out the Prince's eye, and flew away to the student's garret. It was easy enough to get in, as there was a hole in the roof. Through this he darted, and came into the room. The young man had his head buried in his hands, so he did not hear the flutter of the bird's wings, and when he looked up he found the beautiful sapphire lying on the withered violets.
"I am beginning to be appreciated," he cried; "this is from some great admirer. Now I can finish my play," and he looked quite happy.
The next day the Swallow flew down to the harbour. He sat on the mast of a large vessel and watched the sailors hauling big chests out of the hold with ropes. "Heave a-hoy!" they shouted as each chest came up. "I am going to Egypt"! cried the Swallow, but nobody minded, and when the moon rose he flew back to the Happy Prince.
"I am come to bid you good-bye," he cried.
"Swallow, Swallow, little Swallow," said the Prince, "will you not stay with me one night longer?"
"It is winter," answered the Swallow, "and the chill snow will soon be here. In Egypt the sun is warm on the green palm-trees, and the crocodiles lie in the mud and look lazily about them. My companions are building a nest in the Temple of Baalbec, and the pink and white doves are watching them, and cooing to each other. Dear Prince, I must leave you, but I will never forget you, and next spring I will bring you back two beautiful jewels in place of those you have given away. The ruby shall be redder than a red rose, and the sapphire shall be as blue as the great sea."
"In the square below," said the Happy Prince, "there stands a little match-girl. She has let her matches fall in the gutter, and they are all spoiled. Her father will beat her if she does not bring home some money, and she is crying. She has no shoes or stockings, and her little head is bare. Pluck out my other eye, and give it to her, and her father will not beat her."
"I will stay with you one night longer," said the Swallow, "but I cannot pluck out your eye. You would be quite blind then."
"Swallow, Swallow, little Swallow," said the Prince, "do as I command you."
So he plucked out the Prince's other eye, and darted down with it. He swooped past the match-girl, and slipped the jewel into the palm of her hand. "What a lovely bit of glass," cried the little girl; and she ran home, laughing.
Then the Swallow came back to the Prince. "You are blind now," he said, "so I will stay with you always."
"No, little Swallow," said the poor Prince, "you must go away to Egypt."
"I will stay with you always," said the Swallow, and he slept at the Prince's feet.
All the next day he sat on the Prince's shoulder, and told him stories of what he had seen in strange lands. He told him of the red ibises, who stand in long rows on the banks of the Nile, and catch gold-fish in their beaks; of the Sphinx, who is as old as the world itself, and lives in the desert, and knows everything; of the merchants, who walk slowly by the side of their camels, and carry amber beads in their hands; of the King of the Mountains of the Moon, who is as black as ebony, and worships a large crystal; of the great green snake that sleeps in a palm-tree, and has twenty priests to feed it with honey-cakes; and of the pygmies who sail over a big lake on large flat leaves, and are always at war with the butterflies.
"Dear little Swallow," said the Prince, "you tell me of marvellous things, but more marvellous than anything is the suffering of men and of women. There is no Mystery so great as Misery. Fly over my city, little Swallow, and tell me what you see there."
So the Swallow flew over the great city, and saw the rich making merry in their beautiful houses, while the beggars were sitting at the gates. He flew into dark lanes, and saw the white faces of starving children looking out listlessly at the black streets. Under the archway of a bridge two little boys were lying in one another's arms to try and keep themselves warm. "How hungry we are!" they said. "You must not lie here," shouted the Watchman, and they wandered out into the rain.
Then he flew back and told the Prince what he had seen.
"I am covered with fine gold," said the Prince, "you must take it off, leaf by leaf, and give it to my poor; the living always think that gold can make them happy."
Leaf after leaf of the fine gold the Swallow picked off, till the Happy Prince looked quite dull and grey. Leaf after leaf of the fine gold he brought to the poor, and the children's faces grew rosier, and they laughed and played games in the street. "We have bread now!" they cried.
Then the snow came, and after the snow came the frost. The streets looked as if they were made of silver, they were so bright and glistening; long icicles like crystal daggers hung down from the eaves of the houses, everybody went about in furs, and the little boys wore scarlet caps and skated on the ice.
The poor little Swallow grew colder and colder, but he would not leave the Prince, he loved him too well. He picked up crumbs outside the baker's door when the baker was not looking and tried to keep himself warm by flapping his wings.
But at last he knew that he was going to die. He had just strength to fly up to the Prince's shoulder once more. "Good-bye, dear Prince!" he murmured, "will you let me kiss your hand?"
"I am glad that you are going to Egypt at last, little Swallow," said the Prince, "you have stayed too long here; but you must kiss me on the lips, for I love you."
"It is not to Egypt that I am going," said the Swallow. "I am going to the House of Death. Death is the brother of Sleep, is he not?"
And he kissed the Happy Prince on the lips, and fell down dead at his feet.
At that moment a curious crack sounded inside the statue, as if something had broken. The fact is that the leaden heart had snapped right in two. It certainly was a dreadfully hard frost.
Early the next morning the Mayor was walking in the square below in company with the Town Councillors. As they passed the column he looked up at the statue: "Dear me! how shabby the Happy Prince looks!" he said.
"How shabby indeed!" cried the Town Councillors, who always agreed with the Mayor; and they went up to look at it.
"The ruby has fallen out of his sword, his eyes are gone, and he is golden no longer," said the Mayor in fact, "he is litttle beter than a beggar!"
"Little better than a beggar," said the Town Councillors.
"And here is actually a dead bird at his feet!" continued the Mayor. "We must really issue a proclamation that birds are not to be allowed to die here." And the Town Clerk made a note of the suggestion.
So they pulled down the statue of the Happy Prince. "As he is no longer beautiful he is no longer useful," said the Art Professor at the University.
Then they melted the statue in a furnace, and the Mayor held a meeting of the Corporation to decide what was to be done with the metal. "We must have another statue, of course," he said, "and it shall be a statue of myself."
"Of myself," said each of the Town Councillors, and they quarrelled. When I last heard of them they were quarrelling still.
"What a strange thing!" said the overseer of the workmen at the foundry. "This broken lead heart will not melt in the furnace. We must throw it away." So they threw it on a dust-heap where the dead Swallow was also lying.
"Bring me the two most precious things in the city," said God to one of His Angels; and the Angel brought Him the leaden heart and the dead bird.
"You have rightly chosen," said God, "for in my garden of Paradise this little bird shall sing for evermore, and in my city of gold the Happy Prince shall praise me."
The Elf of the Rose
by
Hans Christian Andersen(1839)
IN the midst of a garden grew a rose-tree, in full blossom, and in the prettiest of all the roses lived an elf. He was such a little wee thing, that no human eye could see him. Behind each leaf of the rose he had a sleeping chamber. He was as well formed and as beautiful as a little child could be, and had wings that reached from his shoulders to his feet. Oh, what sweet fragrance there was in his chambers! and how clean and beautiful were the walls! for they were the blushing leaves of the rose.
During the whole day he enjoyed himself in the warm sunshine, flew from flower to flower, and danced on the wings of the flying butterflies. Then he took it into his head to measure how many steps he would have to go through the roads and cross-roads that are on the leaf of a linden-tree. What we call the veins on a leaf, he took for roads; ay, and very long roads they were for him; for before he had half finished his task, the sun went down: he had commenced his work too late. It became very cold, the dew fell, and the wind blew; so he thought the best thing he could do would be to return home. He hurried himself as much as he could; but he found the roses all closed up, and he could not get in; not a single rose stood open. The poor little elf was very much frightened. He had never before been out at night, but had always slumbered secretly behind the warm rose-leaves. Oh, this would certainly be his death. At the other end of the garden, he knew there was an arbor, overgrown with beautiful honey-suckles. The blossoms looked like large painted horns; and he thought to himself, he would go and sleep in one of these till the morning. He flew thither; but “hush!” two people were in the arbor,—a handsome young man and a beautiful lady. They sat side by side, and wished that they might never be obliged to part. They loved each other much more than the best child can love its father and mother.
“But we must part,” said the young man; “your brother does not like our engagement, and therefore he sends me so far away on business, over mountains and seas. Farewell, my sweet bride; for so you are to me.”
And then they kissed each other, and the girl wept, and gave him a rose; but before she did so, she pressed a kiss upon it so fervently that the flower opened. Then the little elf flew in, and leaned his head on the delicate, fragrant walls. Here he could plainly hear them say, “Farewell, farewell;” and he felt that the rose had been placed on the young man’s breast. Oh, how his heart did beat! The little elf could not go to sleep, it thumped so loudly. The young man took it out as he walked through the dark wood alone, and kissed the flower so often and so violently, that the little elf was almost crushed. He could feel through the leaf how hot the lips of the young man were, and the rose had opened, as if from the heat of the noonday sun.
There came another man, who looked gloomy and wicked. He was the wicked brother of the beautiful maiden. He drew out a sharp knife, and while the other was kissing the rose, the wicked man stabbed him to death; then he cut off his head, and buried it with the body in the soft earth under the linden-tree.
“Now he is gone, and will soon be forgotten,” thought the wicked brother; “he will never come back again. He was going on a long journey over mountains and seas; it is easy for a man to lose his life in such a journey. My sister will suppose he is dead; for he cannot come back, and she will not dare to question me about him.”
Then he scattered the dry leaves over the light earth with his foot, and went home through the darkness; but he went not alone, as he thought,—the little elf accompanied him. He sat in a dry rolled-up linden-leaf, which had fallen from the tree on to the wicked man’s head, as he was digging the grave. The hat was on the head now, which made it very dark, and the little elf shuddered with fright and indignation at the wicked deed.
It was the dawn of morning before the wicked man reached home; he took off his hat, and went into his sister’s room. There lay the beautiful, blooming girl, dreaming of him whom she loved so, and who was now, she supposed, travelling far away over mountain and sea. Her wicked brother stopped over her, and laughed hideously, as fiends only can laugh. The dry leaf fell out of his hair upon the counterpane; but he did not notice it, and went to get a little sleep during the early morning hours. But the elf slipped out of the withered leaf, placed himself by the ear of the sleeping girl, and told her, as in a dream, of the horrid murder; described the place where her brother had slain her lover, and buried his body; and told her of the linden-tree, in full blossom, that stood close by.
“That you may not think this is only a dream that I have told you,” he said, “you will find on your bed a withered leaf.”
Then she awoke, and found it there. Oh, what bitter tears she shed! and she could not open her heart to any one for relief.
The window stood open the whole day, and the little elf could easily have reached the roses, or any of the flowers; but he could not find it in his heart to leave one so afflicted. In the window stood a bush bearing monthly roses. He seated himself in one of the flowers, and gazed on the poor girl. Her brother often came into the room, and would be quite cheerful, in spite of his base conduct; so she dare not say a word to him of her heart’s grief.
As soon as night came on, she slipped out of the house, and went into the wood, to the spot where the linden-tree stood; and after removing the leaves from the earth, she turned it up, and there found him who had been murdered. Oh, how she wept and prayed that she also might die! Gladly would she have taken the body home with her; but that was impossible; so she took up the poor head with the closed eyes, kissed the cold lips, and shook the mould out of the beautiful hair.
“I will keep this,” said she; and as soon as she had covered the body again with the earth and leaves, she took the head and a little sprig of jasmine that bloomed in the wood, near the spot where he was buried, and carried them home with her. As soon as she was in her room, she took the largest flower-pot she could find, and in this she placed the head of the dead man, covered it up with earth, and planted the twig of jasmine in it.
“Farewell, farewell,” whispered the little elf. He could not any longer endure to witness all this agony of grief, he therefore flew away to his own rose in the garden. But the rose was faded; only a few dry leaves still clung to the green hedge behind it.
“Alas! how soon all that is good and beautiful passes away,” sighed the elf.
After a while he found another rose, which became his home, for among its delicate fragrant leaves he could dwell in safety. Every morning he flew to the window of the poor girl, and always found her weeping by the flower pot. The bitter tears fell upon the jasmine twig, and each day, as she became paler and paler, the sprig appeared to grow greener and fresher. One shoot after another sprouted forth, and little white buds blossomed, which the poor girl fondly kissed. But her wicked brother scolded her, and asked her if she was going mad. He could not imagine why she was weeping over that flower-pot, and it annoyed him. He did not know whose closed eyes were there, nor what red lips were fading beneath the earth. And one day she sat and leaned her head against the flower-pot, and the little elf of the rose found her asleep. Then he seated himself by her ear, talked to her of that evening in the arbor, of the sweet perfume of the rose, and the loves of the elves. Sweetly she dreamed, and while she dreamt, her life passed away calmly and gently, and her spirit was with him whom she loved, in heaven. And the jasmine opened its large white bells, and spread forth its sweet fragrance; it had no other way of showing its grief for the dead. But the wicked brother considered the beautiful blooming plant as his own property, left to him by his sister, and he placed it in his sleeping room, close by his bed, for it was very lovely in appearance, and the fragrance sweet and delightful. The little elf of the rose followed it, and flew from flower to flower, telling each little spirit that dwelt in them the story of the murdered young man, whose head now formed part of the earth beneath them, and of the wicked brother and the poor sister. “We know it,” said each little spirit in the flowers, “we know it, for have we not sprung from the eyes and lips of the murdered one. We know it, we know it,” and the flowers nodded with their heads in a peculiar manner. The elf of the rose could not understand how they could rest so quietly in the matter, so he flew to the bees, who were gathering honey, and told them of the wicked brother. And the bees told it to their queen, who commanded that the next morning they should go and kill the murderer. But during the night, the first after the sister’s death, while the brother was sleeping in his bed, close to where he had placed the fragrant jasmine, every flower cup opened, and invisibly the little spirits stole out, armed with poisonous spears. They placed themselves by the ear of the sleeper, told him dreadful dreams and then flew across his lips, and pricked his tongue with their poisoned spears. “Now have we revenged the dead,” said they, and flew back into the white bells of the jasmine flowers. When the morning came, and as soon as the window was opened, the rose elf, with the queen bee, and the whole swarm of bees, rushed in to kill him. But he was already dead. People were standing round the bed, and saying that the scent of the jasmine had killed him. Then the elf of the rose understood the revenge of the flowers, and explained it to the queen bee, and she, with the whole swarm, buzzed about the flower-pot. The bees could not be driven away. Then a man took it up to remove it, and one of the bees stung him in the hand, so that he let the flower-pot fall, and it was broken to pieces. Then every one saw the whitened skull, and they knew the dead man in the bed was a murderer. And the queen bee hummed in the air, and sang of the revenge of the flowers, and of the elf of the rose and said that behind the smallest leaf dwells One, who can discover evil deeds, and punish them also.
RUDYARD KIPLING
THE CAT THAT WALKED BY HIMSELF
Hear and attend and listen; for this befell and behappened and became and was, O my Best Beloved, when the Tame animals were wild. The Dog was wild, and the Horse was wild, and the Cow was wild, and the Sheep was wild, and the Pig was wild—as wild as wild could be—and they walked in the Wet Wild Woods by their wild lones. But the wildest of all the wild animals was the Cat. He walked by himself, and all places were alike to him.
Of course the Man was wild too. He was dreadfully wild. He didn’t even begin to be tame till he met the Woman, and she told him that she did not like living in his wild ways. She picked out a nice dry Cave, instead of a heap of wet leaves, to lie down in; and she strewed clean sand on the floor; and she lit a nice fire of wood at the back of the Cave; and she hung a dried wild-horse skin, tail-down, across the opening of the Cave; and she said, ‘Wipe you feet, dear, when you come in, and now we’ll keep house.’
That night, Best Beloved, they ate wild sheep roasted on the hot stones, and flavoured with wild garlic and wild pepper; and wild duck stuffed with wild rice and wild fenugreek and wild coriander; and marrow-bones of wild oxen; and wild cherries, and wild grenadillas. Then the Man went to sleep in front of the fire ever so happy; but the Woman sat up, combing her hair. She took the bone of the shoulder of mutton—the big fat blade-bone—and she looked at the wonderful marks on it, and she threw more wood on the fire, and she made a Magic. She made the First Singing Magic in the world.
Out in the Wet Wild Woods all the wild animals gathered together where they could see the light of the fire a long way off, and they wondered what it meant.
Then Wild Horse stamped with his wild foot and said, ‘O my Friends and O my Enemies, why have the Man and the Woman made that great light in that great Cave, and what harm will it do us?’
Wild Dog lifted up his wild nose and smelled the smell of roast mutton, and said, ‘I will go up and see and look, and say; for I think it is good. Cat, come with me.’
‘Nenni!’ said the Cat. ‘I am the Cat who walks by himself, and all places are alike to me. I will not come.’
‘Then we can never be friends again,’ said Wild Dog, and he trotted off to the Cave. But when he had gone a little way the Cat said to himself, ‘All places are alike to me. Why should I not go too and see and look and come away at my own liking.’ So he slipped after Wild Dog softly, very softly, and hid himself where he could hear everything.
When Wild Dog reached the mouth of the Cave he lifted up the dried horse-skin with his nose and sniffed the beautiful smell of the roast mutton, and the Woman, looking at the blade-bone, heard him, and laughed, and said, ‘Here comes the first. Wild Thing out of the Wild Woods, what do you want?’
Wild Dog said, ‘O my Enemy and Wife of my Enemy, what is this that smells so good in the Wild Woods?’
Then the Woman picked up a roasted mutton-bone and threw it to Wild Dog, and said, ‘Wild Thing out of the Wild Woods, taste and try.’ Wild Dog gnawed the bone, and it was more delicious than anything he had ever tasted, and he said, ‘O my Enemy and Wife of my Enemy, give me another.’
The Woman said, ‘Wild Thing out of the Wild Woods, help my Man to hunt through the day and guard this Cave at night, and I will give you as many roast bones as you need.’
‘Ah!’ said the Cat, listening. ‘This is a very wise Woman, but she is not so wise as I am.’
Wild Dog crawled into the Cave and laid his head on the Woman’s lap, and said, ‘O my Friend and Wife of my Friend, I will help Your Man to hunt through the day, and at night I will guard your Cave.’
‘Ah!’ said the Cat, listening. ‘That is a very foolish Dog.’ And he went back through the Wet Wild Woods waving his wild tail, and walking by his wild lone. But he never told anybody.
When the Man waked up he said, ‘What is Wild Dog doing here?’ And the Woman said, ‘His name is not Wild Dog any more, but the First Friend, because he will be our friend for always and always and always. Take him with you when you go hunting.’
Next night the Woman cut great green armfuls of fresh grass from the water-meadows, and dried it before the fire, so that it smelt like new-mown hay, and she sat at the mouth of the Cave and plaited a halter out of horse-hide, and she looked at the shoulder of mutton-bone—at the big broad blade-bone—and she made a Magic. She made the Second Singing Magic in the world.
Out in the Wild Woods all the wild animals wondered what had happened to Wild Dog, and at last Wild Horse stamped with his foot and said, ‘I will go and see and say why Wild Dog has not returned. Cat, come with me.’
‘Nenni!’ said the Cat. ‘I am the Cat who walks by himself, and all places are alike to me. I will not come.’ But all the same he followed Wild Horse softly, very softly, and hid himself where he could hear everything.
When the Woman heard Wild Horse tripping and stumbling on his long mane, she laughed and said, ‘Here comes the second. Wild Thing out of the Wild Woods what do you want?’
Wild Horse said, ‘O my Enemy and Wife of my Enemy, where is Wild Dog?’
The Woman laughed, and picked up the blade-bone and looked at it, and said, ‘Wild Thing out of the Wild Woods, you did not come here for Wild Dog, but for the sake of this good grass.’
And Wild Horse, tripping and stumbling on his long mane, said, ‘That is true; give it me to eat.’
The Woman said, ‘Wild Thing out of the Wild Woods, bend your wild head and wear what I give you, and you shall eat the wonderful grass three times a day.’
‘Ah,’ said the Cat, listening, ‘this is a clever Woman, but she is not so clever as I am.’ Wild Horse bent his wild head, and the Woman slipped the plaited hide halter over it, and Wild Horse breathed on the Woman’s feet and said, ‘O my Mistress, and Wife of my Master, I will be your servant for the sake of the wonderful grass.’
‘Ah,’ said the Cat, listening, ‘that is a very foolish Horse.’ And he went back through the Wet Wild Woods, waving his wild tail and walking by his wild lone. But he never told anybody.
When the Man and the Dog came back from hunting, the Man said, ‘What is Wild Horse doing here?’ And the Woman said, ‘His name is not Wild Horse any more, but the First Servant, because he will carry us from place to place for always and always and always. Ride on his back when you go hunting.
Next day, holding her wild head high that her wild horns should not catch in the wild trees, Wild Cow came up to the Cave, and the Cat followed, and hid himself just the same as before; and everything happened just the same as before; and the Cat said the same things as before, and when Wild Cow had promised to give her milk to the Woman every day in exchange for the wonderful grass, the Cat went back through the Wet Wild Woods waving his wild tail and walking by his wild lone, just the same as before. But he never told anybody. And when the Man and the Horse and the Dog came home from hunting and asked the same questions same as before, the Woman said, ‘Her name is not Wild Cow any more, but the Giver of Good Food. She will give us the warm white milk for always and always and always, and I will take care of her while you and the First Friend and the First Servant go hunting.
Next day the Cat waited to see if any other Wild thing would go up to the Cave, but no one moved in the Wet Wild Woods, so the Cat walked there by himself; and he saw the Woman milking the Cow, and he saw the light of the fire in the Cave, and he smelt the smell of the warm white milk.
Cat said, ‘O my Enemy and Wife of my Enemy, where did Wild Cow go?’
The Woman laughed and said, ‘Wild Thing out of the Wild Woods, go back to the Woods again, for I have braided up my hair, and I have put away the magic blade-bone, and we have no more need of either friends or servants in our Cave.
Cat said, ‘I am not a friend, and I am not a servant. I am the Cat who walks by himself, and I wish to come into your cave.’
Woman said, ‘Then why did you not come with First Friend on the first night?’
Cat grew very angry and said, ‘Has Wild Dog told tales of me?’
Then the Woman laughed and said, ‘You are the Cat who walks by himself, and all places are alike to you. Your are neither a friend nor a servant. You have said it yourself. Go away and walk by yourself in all places alike.’
Then Cat pretended to be sorry and said, ‘Must I never come into the Cave? Must I never sit by the warm fire? Must I never drink the warm white milk? You are very wise and very beautiful. You should not be cruel even to a Cat.’
Woman said, ‘I knew I was wise, but I did not know I was beautiful. So I will make a bargain with you. If ever I say one word in your praise you may come into the Cave.’
‘And if you say two words in my praise?’ said the Cat.
‘I never shall,’ said the Woman, ‘but if I say two words in your praise, you may sit by the fire in the Cave.’
‘And if you say three words?’ said the Cat.
‘I never shall,’ said the Woman, ‘but if I say three words in your praise, you may drink the warm white milk three times a day for always and always and always.’
Then the Cat arched his back and said, ‘Now let the Curtain at the mouth of the Cave, and the Fire at the back of the Cave, and the Milk-pots that stand beside the Fire, remember what my Enemy and the Wife of my Enemy has said.’ And he went away through the Wet Wild Woods waving his wild tail and walking by his wild lone.
That night when the Man and the Horse and the Dog came home from hunting, the Woman did not tell them of the bargain that she had made with the Cat, because she was afraid that they might not like it.
Cat went far and far away and hid himself in the Wet Wild Woods by his wild lone for a long time till the Woman forgot all about him. Only the Bat—the little upside-down Bat—that hung inside the Cave, knew where Cat hid; and every evening Bat would fly to Cat with news of what was happening.
One evening Bat said, ‘There is a Baby in the Cave. He is new and pink and fat and small, and the Woman is very fond of him.’
‘Ah,’ said the Cat, listening, ‘but what is the Baby fond of?’
‘He is fond of things that are soft and tickle,’ said the Bat. ‘He is fond of warm things to hold in his arms when he goes to sleep. He is fond of being played with. He is fond of all those things.’
‘Ah,’ said the Cat, listening, ‘then my time has come.’
Next night Cat walked through the Wet Wild Woods and hid very near the Cave till morning-time, and Man and Dog and Horse went hunting. The Woman was busy cooking that morning, and the Baby cried and interrupted. So she carried him outside the Cave and gave him a handful of pebbles to play with. But still the Baby cried.
Then the Cat put out his paddy paw and patted the Baby on the cheek, and it cooed; and the Cat rubbed against its fat knees and tickled it under its fat chin with his tail. And the Baby laughed; and the Woman heard him and smiled.
Then the Bat—the little upside-down bat—that hung in the mouth of the Cave said, ‘O my Hostess and Wife of my Host and Mother of my Host’s Son, a Wild Thing from the Wild Woods is most beautifully playing with your Baby.’
‘A blessing on that Wild Thing whoever he may be,’ said the Woman, straightening her back, ‘for I was a busy woman this morning and he has done me a service.’
That very minute and second, Best Beloved, the dried horse-skin Curtain that was stretched tail-down at the mouth of the Cave fell down—whoosh!—because it remembered the bargain she had made with the Cat, and when the Woman went to pick it up—lo and behold!—the Cat was sitting quite comfy inside the Cave.
‘O my Enemy and Wife of my Enemy and Mother of my Enemy,’ said the Cat, ‘it is I: for you have spoken a word in my praise, and now I can sit within the Cave for always and always and always. But still I am the Cat who walks by himself, and all places are alike to me.’
The Woman was very angry, and shut her lips tight and took up her spinning-wheel and began to spin. But the Baby cried because the Cat had gone away, and the Woman could not hush it, for it struggled and kicked and grew black in the face.
‘O my Enemy and Wife of my Enemy and Mother of my Enemy,’ said the Cat, ‘take a strand of the wire that you are spinning and tie it to your spinning-whorl and drag it along the floor, and I will show you a magic that shall make your Baby laugh as loudly as he is now crying.’
‘I will do so,’ said the Woman, ‘because I am at my wits’ end; but I will not thank you for it.’
She tied the thread to the little clay spindle whorl and drew it across the floor, and the Cat ran after it and patted it with his paws and rolled head over heels, and tossed it backward over his shoulder and chased it between his hind-legs and pretended to lose it, and pounced down upon it again, till the Baby laughed as loudly as it had been crying, and scrambled after the Cat and frolicked all over the Cave till it grew tired and settled down to sleep with the Cat in its arms.
‘Now,’ said the Cat, ‘I will sing the Baby a song that shall keep him asleep for an hour. And he began to purr, loud and low, low and loud, till the Baby fell fast asleep. The Woman smiled as she looked down upon the two of them and said, ‘That was wonderfully done. No question but you are very clever, O Cat.’
That very minute and second, Best Beloved, the smoke of the fire at the back of the Cave came down in clouds from the roof—puff!—because it remembered the bargain she had made with the Cat, and when it had cleared away—lo and behold!—the Cat was sitting quite comfy close to the fire.
‘O my Enemy and Wife of my Enemy and Mother of My Enemy,’ said the Cat, ‘it is I, for you have spoken a second word in my praise, and now I can sit by the warm fire at the back of the Cave for always and always and always. But still I am the Cat who walks by himself, and all places are alike to me.’
Then the Woman was very very angry, and let down her hair and put more wood on the fire and brought out the broad blade-bone of the shoulder of mutton and began to make a Magic that should prevent her from saying a third word in praise of the Cat. It was not a Singing Magic, Best Beloved, it was a Still Magic; and by and by the Cave grew so still that a little wee-wee mouse crept out of a corner and ran across the floor.
‘O my Enemy and Wife of my Enemy and Mother of my Enemy,’ said the Cat, ‘is that little mouse part of your magic?’
‘Ouh! Chee! No indeed!’ said the Woman, and she dropped the blade-bone and jumped upon the footstool in front of the fire and braided up her hair very quick for fear that the mouse should run up it.
‘Ah,’ said the Cat, watching, ‘then the mouse will do me no harm if I eat it?’
‘No,’ said the Woman, braiding up her hair, ‘eat it quickly and I will ever be grateful to you.’
Cat made one jump and caught the little mouse, and the Woman said, ‘A hundred thanks. Even the First Friend is not quick enough to catch little mice as you have done. You must be very wise.’
That very moment and second, O Best Beloved, the Milk-pot that stood by the fire cracked in two pieces—ffft—because it remembered the bargain she had made with the Cat, and when the Woman jumped down from the footstool—lo and behold!—the Cat was lapping up the warm white milk that lay in one of the broken pieces.
‘O my Enemy and Wife of my Enemy and Mother of my Enemy, said the Cat, ‘it is I; for you have spoken three words in my praise, and now I can drink the warm white milk three times a day for always and always and always. But still I am the Cat who walks by himself, and all places are alike to me.’
Then the Woman laughed and set the Cat a bowl of the warm white milk and said, ‘O Cat, you are as clever as a man, but remember that your bargain was not made with the Man or the Dog, and I do not know what they will do when they come home.’
‘What is that to me?’ said the Cat. ‘If I have my place in the Cave by the fire and my warm white milk three times a day I do not care what the Man or the Dog can do.’
That evening when the Man and the Dog came into the Cave, the Woman told them all the story of the bargain while the Cat sat by the fire and smiled. Then the Man said, ‘Yes, but he has not made a bargain with me or with all proper Men after me.’ Then he took off his two leather boots and he took up his little stone axe (that makes three) and he fetched a piece of wood and a hatchet (that is five altogether), and he set them out in a row and he said, ‘Now we will make our bargain. If you do not catch mice when you are in the Cave for always and always and always, I will throw these five things at you whenever I see you, and so shall all proper Men do after me.’
‘Ah,’ said the Woman, listening, ‘this is a very clever Cat, but he is not so clever as my Man.’
The Cat counted the five things (and they looked very knobby) and he said, ‘I will catch mice when I am in the Cave for always and always and always; but still I am the Cat who walks by himself, and all places are alike to me.’
‘Not when I am near,’ said the Man. ‘If you had not said that last I would have put all these things away for always and always and always; but I am now going to throw my two boots and my little stone axe (that makes three) at you whenever I meet you. And so shall all proper Men do after me!’
Then the Dog said, ‘Wait a minute. He has not made a bargain with me or with all proper Dogs after me.’ And he showed his teeth and said, ‘If you are not kind to the Baby while I am in the Cave for always and always and always, I will hunt you till I catch you, and when I catch you I will bite you. And so shall all proper Dogs do after me.’
‘Ah,’ said the Woman, listening, ‘this is a very clever Cat, but he is not so clever as the Dog.’
Cat counted the Dog’s teeth (and they looked very pointed) and he said, ‘I will be kind to the Baby while I am in the Cave, as long as he does not pull my tail too hard, for always and always and always. But still I am the Cat that walks by himself, and all places are alike to me.’
‘Not when I am near,’ said the Dog. ‘If you had not said that last I would have shut my mouth for always and always and always; but now I am going to hunt you up a tree whenever I meet you. And so shall all proper Dogs do after me.’
Then the Man threw his two boots and his little stone axe (that makes three) at the Cat, and the Cat ran out of the Cave and the Dog chased him up a tree; and from that day to this, Best Beloved, three proper Men out of five will always throw things at a Cat whenever they meet him, and all proper Dogs will chase him up a tree. But the Cat keeps his side of the bargain too. He will kill mice and he will be kind to Babies when he is in the house, just as long as they do not pull his tail too hard. But when he has done that, and between times, and when the moon gets up and night comes, he is the Cat that walks by himself, and all places are alike to him. Then he goes out to the Wet Wild Woods or up the Wet Wild Trees or on the Wet Wild Roofs, waving his wild tail and walking by his wild lone.
The Catch
by
Gerald Arthur Winter
The young boy had been casting his kudzu net into the shallows for several hours with
no luck. The minnows were too small for the hook on his make-do bamboo pole. He hoped for
a catch that day to match his appetite with a burn in his gut for several days after ingesting only
onion grass, dandelion greens, and one Tiger Lily blossom he’d snatched from an iguana’s sharp
teeth. Without a larger bait fish on his hook cast beyond the shallows before sunset, he’d go to
sleep hungry for the fifth day in a row. Uncle Tuatoo had warned him last week that five days
would be the limit for a forty pound boy under four feet tall before he’d begin to imagine
people and things that aren’t real, but which nevertheless could still physically harm him.
“You will meet your spirits before your time is right,” Tuatoo told his nephew, Zumbata.
“We all will meet our spirits sooner or later, but the later the better, hopefully when we are so
old that endless sleep is more comforting than a life of aches and pains and deep sorrows from
missing those we’d loved.”
“I would like to introduce myself to my spirits now, when I’m alert and agile,” Zumbata
told Tuatoo , the most respected elder of their village. “Then, after I’ve lived a full life, I’ll have
wisdom to share with my ancestors to make their afterlife a blessing of endless delights.”
“You have an upside down view of the universe,” Tuatoo cautioned him. “Time goes
clockwise while your mind spins counterclockwise. You’d best take care that your unbridled
thoughts don’t make the world spin off its axis and take us all with you into a fiery pit of hell
for angering the gods.”
“Kind uncle, I’m thankful for your concern for my wellbeing, but I can’t live this life
without challenging these rules governing our thoughts. They’re laws imposed by man, not
by Nature. And even if some should turn out to be true, they have no hope of real truth unless
they are tested. All laws must be pulled and stretched like my mother’s dough in preparation
for baking bread. How else can we affirm their justification? How can yeast make dough rise,
like my father from the dead, without my tugging at these hard-fast conclusions written in
stone? Bread is life, but stone is death.”
“Stubborn nephew, you will be the death of your mother, my beloved sister, if you don’t
quell these rebellious feelings. Since your father was lost at sea, she depends on you to fill the
void left by your father’s absence. He had the same unruly spirit that now draws you away from
our sad village.”
“What if my father, Chakotah, is merely lost? Perhaps he still lives waiting for his brave
son to bring him home to his waiting family. Shouldn’t I, his only son, attempt to find him?
Wouldn’t my effort to do so make my mother, Saluz, rejoice over my bravery? If I found my
father and brought him back to her, wouldn’t my parents tell the world they have the best
son ever born?”
“Not if you are their dead son, Zumbata. That would break my sister’s heart long before
her scheduled time to leave us. Her mourning wails for her only son would make her moans
for her husband fade into a solemn grief, so hardened that it could never be penetrated or
soothed, even by the infinite expanse of time. Even the gods would whimper for Saluz’s losses.”
“True, wise uncle, but just the same, I must try to find him. I have my whittled scrimshaw
hook, a bamboo pole, and fishing line tough and resilient that I’ve fashioned from my mother’s
coarse black hair. I shall live by my daily catch until I find my father. But don’t look so sad, Uncle
Tuatoo. If I remained in our village just to comfort my mother in her grief, there would be no
hope for my father’s return. If I’m lost, too, and never return, at least the village will carve my
likeness for the Shaman’s alter to honor my memory for my mother. Even in my failure to bring
back my father, I shall be hailed by our village just for trying, and my mother will be glorified
among us for all time.”
Zumbata’s own words from three days prior echoed in his head and curdled in his
stomach pained by his hunger as he continued to cast his net when the sun descended with
half its orange glow behind the sea’s distant horizon. The orange turned crimson dissipating on
the sea into vermillion sparkles that turned violet then were gone. Gentle waves lapped against
the shore, then the warm surf around his ankles made his bare, calloused feet sink into the wet
sand.
He thought he heard a water bird’s trill. but it was different from any he’d ever heard.
There was the whoosh of the surf followed by the trill, then a sudden tug on his kudzu fish net.
Perhaps a school of larger bait fish, he thought, or even a huge fish to stifle his starvation
for several days.
Just when he thought he’d lost his catch, a jolt from the net almost pulled him over
face-first into the surf, but his feet had sunk so deep into the sand that, even in his weakened
state of hunger, he could brace himself against the force threatening to drag him out to sea.
In total darkness of a moonless night, he couldn’t see what was in his net, but its strength
alarmed him as he resisted against it with all his might.
“I’ve got you!” he shouted, but only a trill responded.
He reached deep in his heart for his greatest strength to land the bulk trapped in his net,
but the exertion made him faint from hunger . . .
“Zumbata . . . wake up, Zumbata. It’s your father, Chakotah.”
Zumbata’s eyelids fluttered, but the sun was rising behind the backlit head of the figure
leaning over him so he couldn’t distinguish the face. The voice, however, was surely his father’s.
“Are you speaking to me from the dead, or are you among the living?” Zumbata asked,
but he was answered only by the trill. “I need to know the truth!” he demanded.
He heard heavy swishing beside him and turned to see a long scaly tail thrashing about
trying to get free from the net. He took a deep breath filling his head with an intoxicating scent
of jasmine. He turned back to speak to his father, but the figure was gone. The trill drew him
back to the tail now swirling around his thin bony limbs. Attached to the tail was the naked
torso of a young woman with a concave navel where a ruby the size of a Brazil nut was pinned.
Above were two pert, pink-nippled breasts, and long thin arms and neck upon which rested a
sweet, rosy-cheeked face. Her thin eyebrows were raised above her long-lashed, green eyes
that shimmered at sunrise. Her pink lips were pursed and from them came the same trill.
“Where is my father?” Zumbata asked her. “Do you speak Mandobaba?”
“I speak any language that is spoken to me,” she said. “I thought you were a blue heron,
the way you were standing with your feet so deep in the sand.” She trilled. “See. I was speaking
Squeesquakas, the international language of waterfowl.”
“I don’t know it,” he said.
“Of course not,” she tittered. “You’re not a mermaid.”
“Oh? I see . . . That’s what you are?”
“Well, I’m not a shark or a dolphin, but perhaps a combination of both. I’m a predator
like sharks and crocodiles, but I have a warm heart and breast-feed my young for a year until
they are strong enough to survive on their own.”
“That’s very interesting, but where is my father? He was here just a moment ago.”
“He joined me some time ago beneath the sea and we have a new family together.
Chakotah is a survivor, adaptable to any new environment. You have three half-brothers and
only one sister now. The other was caught in a kudzu net much like yours.”
“She’s dead?”
“Mermaids don’t die, like your father, we adapt. But she’s only half-mermaid, so she’s
mortal, but resourceful. If she takes after me, she’ll be around for the next millennium.”
“My mother loves my father. He must return with me. I owe it to her to bring him home
safely.”
“I’m sorry for her loss, but it’s been my gain. I can’t let him go. He belongs to me now.
The only way to free him, would be to kill me, but I’m the predator, you see, and you a starving
child are my pray. And you’re not much of a meal either. I’ll be hungry again soon. Have you no
brothers or sisters who’ve tagged along behind you, upon whom I might snack later?”
Zumbata grinned sweetly at her, which touched her tender heart as if he were one of
her litter.
“Perhaps I should fatten you up and make a better meal of you another day,” she said,
pulling him close and offering her breast milk.
But as her hardened nipple touched his lips, he reached into his pocket for his scrim-
shaw fishhook and forced it between her ribs into her heart. He was glad she seemed to
suffer no pain. There was no outcry, just a single tear down her rosy cheek quickly turning
pale. Lifeless, her eyes instantly dilated with a thin ooze of blood from her pursed lips.
“Good job, my son, “ Chakotah’s deep voice came from behind with a pat of his hand
on Zumbata’s bony shoulder before all faded into a deep abyss of muted darkness . . .
The morning sun hurt Zumbata’s eyes and made his head ache as he sat up to see his
father Chakotah, his mother Saluz, and his uncle Tuatoo seated on the ground around a fire
roasting a great fish on a spit.
“Once you’ve had a good filling of this tender fish you’ve caught,” Saluz said to him.
“Uncle Tuatoo says your wild imaginations from lack of nourishment for five days will bring you
back to normal.”
“Your mother is right, Zumbata,” Tuatoo said. “I can tell from the glare in your hollow
eyes that you’ve experienced things of which I’d warned you. But don’t be afraid, even if you
still have occasional nightmares about it when you’ve become a young man with children of
your own. None of it was real, or at least not of this world, the world we respect for its rules
and order.”
His father Chakotah said nothing but gave him a wink, which he found comforting until
he bit into a piece of the huge fish he’d caught in the net when he’d found his father washed up
on shore. He chewed around the hard bit of grit concealed under his tongue then waited till he
was alone in bed at night before spitting it into the palm of his hand.
The moon shown bright that night as Zumbata held his palm close to his face. He saw
his own wide-eyed expression reflected in the mermaid’s ruby, red like her blood and the
crystallized remnant of his father Chakotah’s unfaithfulness to his future children’s
grandmother, Saluz, the most honored sister of their village Elder, Tuatoo, whose
empathy for his wronged sibling was greater than her husband’s passion to stray.
Ally Can’t Move
By Amanda Phoenix
The last of the sage stick was crackling. It had burned down and nearly singed Ally’s fingertips. She never believed in the homeopathic way of treating ailments until Gary’s chest X-Ray revealed the spots. Large specks engulfed his lungs, and she would try anything. She called treatment centers as far away as Texas. That was a long ways away for someone who’d only left Florida once, and just barely crossed the Georgia state line at that. She would drive him there if his body held up long enough. She was terrified of airplanes. It wasn’t the crashing to her death part that bothered her. It was being trapped in a confined area with other people, especially kids and babies. She couldn’t get past the baby and kid part.
She laid the burnt sage in the ashtray on her nightstand and cracked the window next to her bed to sneak a cigarette. She felt guilty smoking after her husband’s lung cancer. Gary never said anything to her. He used to ask her to blow a puff in his direction. He had only quit because he literally couldn’t inhale anymore. His chest and lungs were so tight. He didn’t quit because of cancer. He already had it. She put the cigarette to her lips and drew in deeply. The dirt mound where she and Gary buried Senator, the pit bull they rescued as a pup caught her eye through the back window. Senator was laid to rest there when Gary was healthy, the day before his diagnosis. Of course he wasn’t healthy, but until you know that the cancer exists, you think you’re good.
Everything changed that day. He felt fine, but Ally had pressured him to have a full physical including the X-Rays. “Why don’t you do it too?” he questioned. She answered that she hadn’t smoked for twenty years like he had. She started later while he was being treated. That was the shittiest time to start. She’d never been a smoker and his habit repulsed her before she started her own. She had always resisted cigarettes even while growing up in a smoke-filled
home. Her mother too fell victim to lung cancer when Ally was fourteen. That’s the worst time in a girl’s life to lose her mom, she thought.
The day after Gary’s diagnosis, Ally bought six cases of alkaline water from Trader Joes. She called the store to request the bulk order, and a nice teenager brought it outside on a pallet jack. The manager she talked to on the phone told her to pull around to the back of the store. The teenager helped her load it into the trunk of her car. She had cleared all the shit out before she left the house—shoes, an old suitcase, two beach chairs, towels. He smiled at her when their hands met the same case and their fingers brushed each other’s. He was cute. She felt like a cold bitch for even thinking it. She thanked him and pulled away from the store.
Gary spit the first sip of water out onto the kitchen counter. “This tastes like shit.”
Ally took a sip from his cup. “It tastes no different than any other water. You’re just being a skeptic. I’ve heard this works.”
“You really think water is going to cure cancer, Ally? Well, fuck. I think I’m fine now.” He smirked at her.
“Don’t be a smart ass. They say cancer can’t live and breed in an alkaline environment.”
“Who says that?”
“I read it somewhere. I forget where.”
“Wouldn’t cancer be history if that was true?
You know I don’t believe half that shit
you read. I just don’t buy it.”
“Just drink the fucking water.” Ally slid the cup back in front of him on the edge of the counter. Some of it splashed over the side and onto the floor.
“Wait, you’re wasting precious miracle water,” he yelled after she left the room.
Ally had done her research. She spent four hours googling cancer treatments after they came home from the doctor’s office on diagnosis day. She couldn’t stand spending that much time on the computer. Why waste your life in front of a screen? Go out and fucking live it. Now, she couldn’t pull herself away. She had no choice. Chemo was too harsh and Ally never believed in it. She watched her mother deteriorate from the inside out during her battle ten years earlier. Why put Gary through that same hell? She knew she could find another way to save him.
She had to.
On day three, Ally spent the first hour of her workday on the phone with an alternative treatment center. The pleasant woman on the other end gave her a list of unconventional remedies. The woman explained to Ally that they were not cures because there was no cure. But by trying some of the options available, Gary could be kept comfortable. “I’m not looking for comfortable,” Ally said with haste in her voice. She felt like she was choking on dust particles. “There’s got to be something we can do.” The nice woman assured Ally that while there wasn’t a way to cure the cancer, chemo wasn’t the only option for improving Gary’s condition. “Chemo isn’t an option. It doesn’t improve anything. Believe me, I watched my mother come apart on that shit.” The nice woman gently asked her not to swear. Ally apologized. She explained that she was just frustrated and wanted—no needed—to find another way.
Ally spent the last hour of her workday googling acupuncture. It was number one on the list of remedies that had been discussed with her. She knew Gary wouldn’t think much of lying on a folding table while some hack loaded tiny needles into his body—all over his body. She thought about getting him high before telling him that she’d called his primary doctor from her work phone for acupuncture specialist recommendations, and made an appointment with the third one on the list. That he’d be going in for treatment in a week. She didn’t give him his
favorite drink or pack a bowl from his not so secret stash. She just told him. She knew what his argument would be before he said it. “Shouldn’t we just try the chemo?” It was nice that he thought about it as “we.” He could have told her that it’s his fucking body, and he’d take what he thought was the best route. But no, he included her. He tried her suggestions. “Fine. I’ll try a few of your hokey solutions. Then, we’re going chemo.” She nodded to appease him.
Gary didn’t say much when Ally asked him about the session. When he got home, he didn’t seem more relaxed. She’d begged to go with him, but he said no. He included her in the decisions, but not so much the results of the decisions they made together. She knew she couldn’t be in the room with him, and she honestly didn’t want to because the thought of the needles creeped her out. She wanted to drive him there and be in the waiting area when he was done. Even though losing him wasn’t an option in her mind, she wanted to spend every second that she could with him.
“Don’t treat me like I’m dying unless you’re ready to admit that I’m dying,” Gary said in response to Ally’s nagging about him not letting her drive him.
“You’re not dying, goddamn it.” Ally looked up. “Oh, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to say that.” She focused her attention back to Gary. “I just want you to let me
be part of this.”
“You’re not missing anything. I promise.”
Ally walked into the kitchen to pour a big glass of alkaline water. She brought the cup back into the living room and handed it to Gary. He rolled his eyes, but gulped it down. “How many of these remedies are you going to push on me?”
“I booked you a massage. It’s Tuesday.”
“Okay.” Gary’s forehead wrinkled.
“It’ll relax you. Maybe all this stuff I’m pushing on you will relax the cancer, too.”
Again, he rolled his eyes.
In bed that night, Ally plugged her phone charger into the wall outlet. Soothing sounds started to ooze out of the speaker. Gary popped his head up off the pillow. A female speaking in a monotone voice chimed in and told him to take a deep breath and relax. “What now?” he said.
Ally rolled over to face Gary. “It’s a meditation app.
I downloaded it today on work’s wifi.”
“Yeah, cause I’m worried about you draining our data plan.”
It was Ally’s turn to roll her eyes, but Gary couldn’t see her in their dark bedroom.
Over the span of three months, Ally and Gary did yoga in their living room in front of a beginners DVD playing on the TV. Gary gave up the idea of arguing with Ally for a while. He just went with it. He didn’t have the energy to argue with her. When Ally suggested something, he tried it out. None of it hurt him. Why should he have given her a hard time? She was only suggesting all of this to help him. She wanted to make him better. She had to make him better. But she couldn’t make him better.
Ally tried to move on quickly from Gary. After he died, her best friend Charity flew in from Michigan for two months. Charity was in between jobs. She’d been fired from the insurance agency where she worked for three years after she failed a drug test for the third time. They offered her treatment each time, but she refused. Ally was surprised they didn’t can her after the first cup full of positive piss. Ally thought that Charity wanted to get fired so that she
could be with Ally during her so-called worst days of grief. Also, Ally living in Florida didn’t hurt. Ally sometimes thought that Charity lived her life like she was always on vacation. Charity had been through more jobs than the years she’d been alive.
The two started going to bars the day after the funeral. Ally guessed her family, especially Gary’s side, wouldn’t approve. “Fuck em,” Charity always said when Ally talked to her about it.
“You’re a horrible influence on me. So thank you,” Ally said
A stranger Ally took to a motel room from the dive bar wrapped his arms around her waist and held her from behind. They had swayed back and forth to the country version of I Don’t Want to Miss a Thing in the area between the bathrooms and the unoccupied dart board machines. “You’re so beautiful,” he whispered in her ear back at the motel. She didn’t want to hear that. She twisted him around and bounced him onto the bed. She ripped his jean zipper down so hard that she scratched his stomach just above his confederate flag belt buckle. She scrunched her nose at the sight of it. Fuck it, she thought. Just one night.
That redneck lasted just over two minutes. Either she was much prettier than he was used to or it’d been a while since he’d been laid. Ally didn’t care. She was used to being dissatisfied. He rolled onto his side, facing her. She sat up, and grabbed her shirt and bra from the night stand. He touched her hand softly and patted the spot on the bed right next to his chest for her to lie down next to him. She didn’t do cuddling. Especially not with him. She rarely snuggled up to Gary in bed. Why do we need to be touching? She whipped her shirt over her head and stood up to pull her skirt down (which never left her body) and stepped into her shoes. “Where ya goin?”
he asked. She slung her purse strap over her shoulder without answering. “Can I call you?” She said no and left the room.
On the way home, she called Charity.
“I can barely hear you, Al. Where are you?” The reception broke in and out and there was a lot of feedback from Ally’s end.
“275. I went to Brooksville.”
“What the fuck did you go there for?”
“I met a guy online. I met him at a bar up there.”
“You drove all the way up there just to get dick?”
“That’s not why I went.”
“So, no dick? You didn’t get any?”
“Well. Maybe two minutes’ worth if that’s what you want to call it.” Ally dropped the phone from where she had held it against the steering wheel while they shared a cackle that resembled the sounds of birds trying to kill each other. They talked and laughed until Ally made it back to her house.
Ally talked to Charity over the phone three times a week since Charity had been back in Michigan. “How the fuck did you do that?” Charity asked.
She never beat around the bush.
Ally had just bought roller blades. She knew she needed the exercise. Eighteen extra pounds had found their way onto her figure since Gary died, and she thought she should find a fun way to exert some of her energy, even though she never felt like she had any to spare. The city had recently added twenty new miles to the fitness trail, and it now passed right through her neighborhood. New flowers and palm trees were planted along the edges, tax payer money not
wasted on frivolous bullshit. Finally. She bought the skates at Brook Stone. She figured the more she paid for them, the safer she would feel.
Maybe they would be fall proof.
An ambulance pulled up alongside the trail to take her away. There went some of the tax payer funded sod Ally was so happy about. When the doctor came into her small slice of the emergency room blocked off by an almost sheer white curtain, she learned that she broke her leg in two places. How was that possible? She was on the skates for less than five minutes. She would be out of work for up to six months. Minimum of three. All she could think about was that she didn’t want to end up back in that fucking trailer park where she started her Florida life. Gary got her out of there, and now he was the reason she may have to go back. She saw everything slip away from her during the slow motion fall. Her job, the house she and Gary had built. The life she finally had.
Now that Ally was laid up in bed, she wondered if she should’ve handled anything differently than she had. Did she do enough for Gary’s cancer? Did she do enough for Gary? Did she give up too easily? Should they have been more aggressive with his treatment? Should she have been more aggressive with the doctors? So many questions. Absolutely no fucking answers. Ally could’ve really used Charity here now. She could have run her errands for her and helped her with her physical therapy exercises. But mostly Charity could’ve just been there.
In her bed, all Ally could do was think. About Gary. About the dozen or so men she used to fill the time so that she didn’t think about Gary every second. But she still did. Even when she was on top of another man or a man was on top of her or behind her, she thought of Gary. She remembered how soft and tender he was. He always took it slow until he was almost ready to finish.
She demanded her randoms to fuck her rough.
She didn’t want them to remind her of Gary.
She wanted to let go of him. At least while she was having sex with someone else. She wanted to let go of their sex. Their perfect soft gentle sex.
Ally tried to hang on to the house she and Gary had built. It was two thousand square feet—much more than the two of them needed. They had it built when they thought children were in their future. They had already moved in and furnished their new place when Ally learned that she could not provide a suitable womb for a fetus. Not only that. She would need to have some procedures done and go back on birth control in order to regulate her hormone levels. When she asked the doctor if it would be possible to try again in a few years, he told her that it wouldn’t be impossible to try anything. He left it at that. Two days later, Gary surprised her with Senator. Four years later, Gary and Senator were dead.
Ally wondered if she could have saved Senator with sage burning and chants and homemade natural lotions. She couldn’t save Gary with it. Sometimes she thought maybe the combination of remedies killed Gary faster. Maybe she should have started fucking strangers from bars before Gary died. Maybe that would have helped her. How in the fuck could that have helped her? Maybe fucking someone else could have detached her from him. Disconnected them completely. Maybe she wouldn’t miss their love. Maybe if she found the right random bar guy or frat boy or successful business man. Maybe the best way to get over one is to get atop another. Or under, but Ally was more of a top rider. Except with Gary. She didn’t mind being under Gary.
She had spent months going out with co-workers, taking guys to hotels—she never took them home—drinking much more than ever, all trying to drown out missing Gary. Before the rollerblades, she thought it might be working. She really only cried at night when she was falling asleep alone. No Senator. No Gary. “Get another dog,” Charity urged almost every time they talked. It wasn’t that simple. Just like getting another man wasn’t that simple. She married Gary
when she was twenty two. She lost him when she was forty three. Twenty one years. Twenty one years wasn’t something you could erase with a new dog
or a new man to fuck. She tried.
The temporary home nurse, Olivia walked into the room with a tray. There was a grilled cheese sandwich with tomato slices and a lump of cottage cheese on the side. Ally stubbed the sage stick the rest of the way out in the ashtray. Olivia moved in right after Ally’s surgery. Ally wished she could stay forever. She never needed to get up out of her bed while Olivia was around. She hated staying in bed. But it was nice not having to lift a finger for herself. There was no right answer. If she was stuck in bed, she wished she could get up. If she needed to get up,
she wished she could stay in bed.
Olivia didn’t know much about Ally’s life before her broken leg. Framed pictures of Gary hung in almost every room in the house, but she didn’t ask about him. Ally never mentioned him either. Boxes were stacked up in every room. Almost every loose item had been packed, but Ally saved the picture frames for last. She wanted the reminder every time she passed the fire place mantle. She wanted to be an observer of her old life whenever she glanced up at the wall. That life didn’t exist anymore, and the photos were the only proof that it had.
Ally couldn’t walk, but she had to be out of her house in six weeks. The new couple would move in. They would make their own memories in Ally and Gary’s house. They would fill the home with pictures of themselves and their family. This new woman stuffing cake into her husband’s mouth on their wedding day. A new dog would sniff every corner of the house that his nose would fit, wondering who and where Senator is. Ally imagined the new couple’s dog would be named Rover or Bozo—something uncreative. She and Gary came up with Senator because he reminded them of a politician when he was a puppy. No one understood that answer, and Ally
nor Gary could explain it. The new woman would want kids like Ally did. The dog would play second fiddle to a new baby. Senator probably would have too.
Ally wondered how this new woman would handle a cancer diagnosis. Would she take the same steps as Ally? Would she skip all of the hokey shit and send her husband right to chemotherapy or radiation? Would this new woman be willing to part with her long, glossy blonde hair as a symbol that “we’re in this together” when her husband started to lose his curly red top? People did that to show support to their loved ones. Ally didn’t know what she would have done if Gary’s hair had started coming out. She loved her hair. It was her thing. Besides her boobs, her long curly hair was her accessory of envy according to her friends.
Would the new woman sympathize with Ally’s situation? If Ally couldn’t move in six weeks, would this woman give her more time?
An excerpt from a novel
COMFORT GIRLS
by
Gerald Arthur Winter
Yoko was Chinese-Korean, a term that refers to Koreans whose parents or grandparents
had fled from the Korean conflict in 1949. According to their relatives who had remained in
South Korea during World War II and the Korean War, their ancestors had fled in the wrong
direction to China. Those immigrants had settled in the southeast province of China called
Manchuria. This area was regained from the Japanese by Red China after WWII. Although the Koreans who had settled in Manchuria continued to speak Korean and maintained their culture and customs, many married Chinese and the two cultures became entwined. Though ethnically Korean in the 1950’s, these people, out of necessity to survive, became bilingual and adapted many aspects of the Chinese culture. That included food and social practices which have stemmed from the mix of Asian ideologies and 20th Century Communism under Chairman Mao.
Though not as harsh as the North Korean austerity had been during the Korean War to
the present, China was undergoing a transition from the 80’s to the 90’s. These changes created emotional turmoil based on the slim hope of civil rights in the future for Communist Chinese society. Yoko longed for what America promised, so much that she found a way with several others on a cargo ship to escape China. She had no idea where the ship was headed, but among a dozen Chinese, she paid ten thousand yuan to wherever the ship would take her outside China.
The ship faced several storms on the open sea, and two of the dozen Chinese stowaways
died from dehydration after suffering seasickness and vomiting the little bit of food they had
to eat. Hypothermia took three more lives after getting drenched during storms. Locked in the
hull, there was no chance to dry their clothes. It was always dark below deck and Yoko began
to think her fleeing China had been a bad choice.
Cramped from dehydration and little space to stand or stretch made Yoko want to die.
She vowed to inhale the saltwater deeply if the raging sea flooded the hull. But she prayed to
Buddha to make her death painless. She preferred to die quickly. When she fell asleep on her
tenth day at sea, she expected to wake in Buddha’s Garden, or with waning faith, to never wake again and become just a minute particle of the vast universe.
With little hope or strength left, Yoko was stirred by a clamor at the hatch cover. She and
the remaining seven Chinese survivors squinted their eyes. A bright sunbeam from the blue sky above the deck gave her a sharp headache. Despite the piercing sunlight, the smell of fresh salt air brightened her spirit.
Shading her eyes with both hands to peer at the land, she shouted, “Thank you, Buddha!
I feel no pain. Though I’m dead, your garden is lush and beautiful.”
With asides in Chinese, the first mate and captain laughed at her foolishness and ignorance.
“Buddha’s Garden has a name,” the captain told her.
“I didn’t know,” she said with apology. “What is it called?”
The first mate doubled over with laughter then spat his answer, “Mexico!”
Two of the prettier, younger women were led away by a Mexican who strapped chains around their wrists and bound them together. When another Mexican came toward Yoko, she pulled a note from her threadbare shirt. The Mexican looked at it with a squint then grumbled to the captain, “Esta mujer es nuestra cocinera.”
“Okay, then take her to your kitchen,” the Chinese captain said in broken Spanish with his word rhythm curt and jerky like his native tongue. Yoko felt her Korean had an even flow
while her Chinese sounded like silverware falling onto a ceramic tiled floor—clinkitty-clank ... clickitty-clunk.
As the Mexican led Yoko along the dock, the Chinese captain shouted in a collage of English and Spanish, “Good thing she can cook. Her ass is too flat.”
The Mexican nodded his head then grinned at Yoko. He was her main contact in Mexico
to get her across the border into the States. Pablo patted her shoulder and smiled wide, toothy
and beaming white against his deep-tanned face. A friendly façade from a stranger, but Pablo’s wife was Chinese-Korean, so he knew some expressions that Yoko would understand to put her at ease. “Chosupso eeayo,” he said, making her smile and even laugh.
“They’re assholes,” he said, referring to the captain and crew.
Yoko spent two weeks with Pablo and his wife, Hwan Song, in her fifties and ten years
younger than Pablo. Yoko remained on a waiting list to join a party to sneak across the border
into Texas where another contact would provide fake IDs so she could find work in America.
The greatest impediment to Yoko’s finding work would be learning English, but that was her
least concern. Now she was a displaced person without a country.
When her call came to join a party to cross the border, Yoko was saddened to leave Hwan
Song and her kind husband, Pablo. Even life in Mexico for her was much better than in China.
She felt insecure about leaving the comforts of staying with a family she could converse with in her own language, but Pablo made it clear to her, saying,” Time to move it. America waits for you.”
Yoko was among a party of three women and seventeen men, all Mexicans. She was nervous with no one to talk to in either Chinese or Korean. She’d heard that many women had been
raped in these tunnel passages, but she’d been spared by the Mexican illegals and wasn’t threatened. Not until the Border Patrol officer, who’d been paid to look the other way, demanded that the group give up one of the women for his pleasure or he’d arrest them all.
That’s when the Mexicans stuck together to protect their own. The guard took his pleasure
with a gun to Yoko’s head, but she feared he’d kill her afterwards anyway.
The Mexicans looked the other way with shame in their hearts. Though over in less than
a minute, they were seconds that would seem a millennium in Yoko’s mind. She had come this far and was not about to weaken. Her Chinese-Korean contact in Texas was a welcome sight, and Yoko remained in that safe-house close to the border for a month before she was told it was time to move again.
* * *
Travel by bus or train was the least dangerous for illegals at the time. Prior to 9/11/01,
Immigration became lax once an illegal found a place to live and work. Being Chinese gave
Yoko better status and Immigration protection than South Koreans, because she was fleeing
China, a Communist enemy. That gave her refugee status. With help from bilingual Chinese-
American attorneys, she got a 30-day tourist visa. In the months to come, she’d obtain a temporary Social Security card, then she’d meet with a Korean woman named Lana who had become an American citizen and owned an Asian Spa in New Jersey.
“I will teach you acupressure and Swedish massage,” Lana said over bowls of kimchi
and rice in a Korean restaurant. Yoko was amazed to peer out the restaurant window and see
on Boulevard in Palisades Park, Hangul Korean characters spelled out on store fronts and traffic signs. The Bergen County town was second only to Korea Town in LA and Flushing in Queens with the most Koreans concentrated in America outside of Seoul.
Yoko agreed and learned quickly from Lana about how superior the art of Asian massage
was to all other forms of physical therapy by considering not just the body, but the mind and soul with every application. Lana gave Yoko her spa name, “Ginny.”
“Dress modestly with tight garments that are difficult to penetrate or remove,” Lana
instructed. “Let no customer touch you, never ask for a tip, but men will expect manual release.
We charge sixty dollars an hour and forty for a half-hour. I will teach you how to make them
cum fast—party over—Next!”
“Why, unni?” Ginny asked, her expression still naïve despite the tunnel nightmare.
“Until a man has that release, he could be all over you. Once he goes limp, he’ll be in a hurry to get home to his wife and kids. Help him get there, but never go along for the ride--
that’s big trouble.”
“Of course not, unni.”
“None of my girls are permitted to give out their phone numbers to customers or to everybody to see a customer outside my spa. If you do, you’re gone. Got it?”
“Yes, unni, I will do everything you say. Thank you for this chance to make money. I
have no place to stay. Will I sleep at the spa?”
“Never! That’s against the law. The town will shut me down,” Lana warned. “My boyfriend will pick us up every night and take us to our home. I want ten dollars a day from each
girl’s earnings to provide food, which I will prepare three times a day.”
“You are generous, unni.”
“For an hour customer you get twenty dollars of the sixty, on the half-hour you get ten
dollars of the forty. If you are good, they will tip well, from forty dollars to one hundred dollars. If you have a problem customer, you call for me. I will handle it. If your English isn’t good enough to understand that a customer might be asking for a blow job or sex, act dumb and say you are sorry, but we only give acupressure and Swedish massage, no boom-boom.”
“Of course, unni, I’d never do that,” Yoko said, recalling the horror of the tunnel and the border guard’s hot sweaty hands tugging at her garments, and forcing her legs apart.
“Spread your legs!!” he’d rasped.
She felt queasy now, just as she had then when he trusted himself inside her.
“If you ever endanger my business by offering sex to a customer, you’d be better off getting arrested and deported compared to what I’ll do to you. Do you understand me?”
Ginny nodded, trying to shut out the way the border guard’s eyes had consumed her.
Her body jerked recalling his rapid painful penetrations and the burning. She tried to hold back now with Lana’s sharp instructions, unlike in the tunnel, but those dark memories welled
inside her and her body jerked spastically until she vomited on Lana’s immaculate ceramic-tiled floor.
“Igo!” Lana gasped, but her attention was to Ginny, not her spotless floor. She took Ginny to the shower room and stripped off her clothes. Lana gently sponged Ginny’s quivering naked body. Their eyes met with knowing unity. “Poor baby. Was it the tunnel where this happened to you?”
Ginny nodded then shook and wept.
“It’s okay now, unni. You’ll always be safe here with me. I will take care of you.”
* * *
Yoko worked only three months before one customer began to request her twice a week.
George was a bachelor in his fifties. He would never ask for anything from Yoko, but he would kiss her hands before and after his massage.
“You’ve been sent to me from heaven,” he’d tell her.
Yoko learned English quickly because she spent so much time in Lana’s home where her boyfriend, Bobby, insisted that Lana speak English at home to all her girls.
“How the hell are they ever gonna pass their citizenship tests if you keep talking to them in Korean,” Bobby often complained. With a fast turnover of girls, none other than Ginny had
stayed long enough to speak English fluently.
“Thank you, Bobby,” Ginny told him. “My English is getting much better.”
“Great. So what does it mean if I say I want a blow job?”
Ginny’s eyes widened with understanding, but Lana stepped in from the kitchen with a
butcher knife waving in her hand as she said, “It means I’m gonna cut off your balls.”
“Jesus, Lana,” Bobby groaned. “I was just testing to keep her out of trouble.”
The comforts of Lana’s home and the respect she felt in the spa had begun to put Yoko’s memory of the tunnel behind her. George was the only man she’d ever felt completely comforttable with. He spoke slowly and softly, often in a whisper, telling her everything about him.
He’d dated a few American women over the years, but had never married. His parents had died some time ago, but he had one sister and they were close. He wanted to introduce her to his sister, so someone he trusted could see how wonderful they could be together outside the
spa. She could only tell him about her illegal immigration from China and the tunnel, but not
what had happened in the tunnel. She hoped she’d never have to tell him about that.
After he kissed her hands, she began to lift up her face for a kiss. They’d been doing that
for almost a year when he whispered in her ear, “I love you, Ginny.”
“I love you, too,” she admitted. “I feel at home with you. That I’ve known you forever.
“I feel the same. I’m so happy the moment I see you, but it pains my heart each time we
part. We must do something about it soon, or I’ll burst from sadness, Ginny.”
“My real name is Yoko. Call me Ginny in front of others, but when we’re alone, please
call me Yoko. Then I’ll know you love me for who I really am, and not just for what I do.”
“I love you, Yoko,” he said, making her sigh, and for the first time, their kiss lingered and
their tongues entwined with a flutter like a butterfly’s wings.
* * *
Though she made several friends with many girls who came to work for Lana, Ginny had
become Lana’s number one girl, the worker Lana could always trust and depend on in any situation. Lana and her life mate, Bobby, soon thought of Ginny as family. After more than a year of loyalty to Lana, unlike several other girls who used Lana’s spa as a springboard to become spa owner’s themselves, Ginny asked a favor, though her hands shook with fear over how Lana would respond.
“Unni, I must speak with you about a problem,” Ginny said.
Lana frowned. “Problem? Some customer bothered you?”
“No-no, Unni. I am the problem.”
“You are never a problem to me. What do you mean?”
“There is a man, a customer, who is very kind and gentle.”
Lana grimaced and huffed.
“Unni, forgive me, but I love him,” Ginny said.
“I could ban him from my spa! You’d never see him again!”
“That’s the problem, unni. If you do that, I will have to leave and go with him. We are in love.”
Lana had come to know Ginny’s heart as well as her own. She embraced her and felt her shudder in her arms. “Is it George?”
“How did you know?”
“Buddha tells me everything,” Lana said, wiping tears from Ginny’s cheeks. “You cannot
tell any of my other girls. We will tell them that Bobby is driving you to the bus to visit a friend in Flushing. George will meet you at the bus station on Saturday at 6 p.m. and Bobby will pick you up at the bus station on Monday at 8:30 a.m. George must never come to my spa again. After one month, we will see if you still feel the same. If not, you are welcome back and I will never mention it again, but George can never come here again. If you still want to see him in this way, you must find out all about him, his profession, his past marriages, his children, then you’ll tell me everything you’ve learned about him. I say this for your protection, because I love you like a little sister. If he’s no good, and you think he just wants to fuck you then leave you, you must tell me and be rid of him. If he loves you, he must marry you.”
“How can I thank you enough, Unni?”
“You can’t,” Lana said. “But I expect you to try.”
* * *
“I will never find such a wonderful woman as you, Yoko. Will you marry me?”
“Lana is my family in America,” she said. “I want to show her our respect by having you
ask her for my hand in marriage. The karma from this goodwill will give us Buddha’s blessing for all our life together.”
With Bobby at her side and Yoko and George across the table at Gregory’s Seafood,” Lana said, “You have my blessing, unni, but if Georgie is ever bad to you, I will put a curse on him forever.”
George blinked nervously as he took the engagement ring from his pocket and looked to Lana’s boyfriend, his fellow American, Bobby, for support.
“No idle threat, George. Lana means every word,” Bobby said. “And if Buddha’s curse
doesn’t scare you into taking the best care of our unni, my Glock 19 will, in case you’d like a
9mm enema.”
Hands shaking, George slipped the ring on Ginny’s finger with a sigh of relief, then asked, “What now?”
Bobby shook his hand and said, “We’re gonna take a limo to Atlantic City and get shitfaced at the casinos.”
George gave Yoko a look of concern, and justifiably so, because after five hours in Atlantic City, Lana had to be carried over Bobby’s shoulder away from the high-rollers’ blackjack table at 4 a.m. Casino security officers gave Bobby no choice. It was either him or them, who described Lana as, “Crazy as a shithouse rat.”
Though continuing to drink shots of soju until sunrise at home, the Koreans’ women’s hangovers would last another 48 hours. Buddha, it seemed in Yoko’s mind, had hung his head in disgust over two of his favorites, her and her unni, Lana. Yoko, thought that perhaps Buddha had stretched his blessings to the limit for Lana that night.
“I want more dancing! Come on! Let’s move it!” Lana shouted near 6 a.m. “I want more
soju!” Then she passed out cold with no recollection of anything she’d said or done at the casino the night before.
THE CASK OF AMONTILLADO
by Edgar Allan Poe
(1846)
THE thousand injuries of Fortunato I had borne as I best could, but when he ventured upon insult I vowed revenge. You, who so well know the nature of my soul, will not suppose, however, that gave utterance to a threat. At length I would be avenged; this was a point definitely, settled --but the very definitiveness with which it was resolved precluded the idea of risk. I must not only punish but punish with impunity. A wrong is unredressed when retribution overtakes its redresser. It is equally unredressed when the avenger fails to make himself felt as such to him who has done the wrong.
It must be understood that neither by word nor deed had I given Fortunato cause to doubt my good will. I continued, as was my in to smile in his face, and he did not perceive that my to smile now was at the thought of his immolation.
He had a weak point --this Fortunato --although in other regards he was a man to be respected and even feared. He prided himself on his connoisseurship in wine. Few Italians have the true virtuoso spirit. For the most part their enthusiasm is adopted to suit the time and opportunity, to practise imposture upon the British and Austrian millionaires. In painting and gemmary, Fortunato, like his countrymen, was a quack, but in the matter of old wines he was sincere. In this respect I did not differ from him materially; --I was skilful in the Italian vintages myself, and bought largely whenever I could.
It was about dusk, one evening during the supreme madness of the carnival season, that I encountered my friend. He accosted me with excessive warmth, for he had been drinking much. The man wore motley. He had on a tight-fitting parti-striped dress, and his head was surmounted by the conical cap and bells. I was so pleased to see him that I thought I should never have done wringing his hand.
I said to him --"My dear Fortunato, you are luckily met. How remarkably well you are looking to-day. But I have received a pipe of what passes for Amontillado, and I have my doubts."
"How?" said he. "Amontillado, A pipe? Impossible! And in the middle of the carnival!"
"I have my doubts," I replied; "and I was silly enough to pay the full Amontillado price without consulting you in the matter. You were not to be found, and I was fearful of losing a bargain."
"Amontillado!"
"I have my doubts."
"Amontillado!"
"And I must satisfy them."
"Amontillado!"
"As you are engaged, I am on my way to Luchresi. If any one has a critical turn it is he. He will tell me --"
"Luchresi cannot tell Amontillado from Sherry."
"And yet some fools will have it that his taste is a match for your own.
"Come, let us go."
"Whither?"
"To your vaults."
"My friend, no; I will not impose upon your good nature. I perceive you have an engagement. Luchresi--"
"I have no engagement; --come."
"My friend, no. It is not the engagement, but the severe cold with which I perceive you are afflicted. The vaults are insufferably damp. They are encrusted with nitre."
"Let us go, nevertheless. The cold is merely nothing. Amontillado! You have been imposed upon. And as for Luchresi, he cannot distinguish Sherry from Amontillado."
Thus speaking, Fortunato possessed himself of my arm; and putting on a mask of black silk and drawing a roquelaire closely about my person, I suffered him to hurry me to my palazzo.
There were no attendants at home; they had absconded to make merry in honour of the time. I had told them that I should not return until the morning, and had given them explicit orders not to stir from the house. These orders were sufficient, I well knew, to insure their immediate disappearance, one and all, as soon as my back was turned.
I took from their sconces two flambeaux, and giving one to Fortunato, bowed him through several suites of rooms to the archway that led into the vaults. I passed down a long and winding staircase, requesting him to be cautious as he followed. We came at length to the foot of the descent, and stood together upon the damp ground of the catacombs of the Montresors.
The gait of my friend was unsteady, and the bells upon his cap jingled as he strode.
"The pipe," he said.
"It is farther on," said I; "but observe the white web-work which gleams from these cavern walls."
He turned towards me, and looked into my eves with two filmy orbs that distilled the rheum of intoxication.
"Nitre?" he asked, at length.
"Nitre," I replied. "How long have you had that cough?"
"Ugh! ugh! ugh! --ugh! ugh! ugh! --ugh! ugh! ugh! --ugh! ugh! ugh! --ugh! ugh! ugh!"
My poor friend found it impossible to reply for many minutes.
"It is nothing," he said, at last.
"Come," I said, with decision, "we will go back; your health is precious. You are rich, respected, admired, beloved; you are happy, as once I was. You are a man to be missed. For me it is no matter. We will go back; you will be ill, and I cannot be responsible. Besides, there is Luchresi --"
"Enough," he said; "the cough's a mere nothing; it will not kill me. I shall not die of a cough."
"True --true," I replied; "and, indeed, I had no intention of alarming you unnecessarily --but you should use all proper caution. A draught of this Medoc will defend us from the damps.
Here I knocked off the neck of a bottle which I drew from a long row of its fellows that lay upon the mould.
"Drink," I said, presenting him the wine.
He raised it to his lips with a leer. He paused and nodded to me familiarly, while his bells jingled.
"I drink," he said, "to the buried that repose around us."
"And I to your long life."
He again took my arm, and we proceeded.
"These vaults," he said, "are extensive."
"The Montresors," I replied, "were a great and numerous family."
"I forget your arms."
"A huge human foot d'or, in a field azure; the foot crushes a serpent rampant whose fangs are imbedded in the heel."
"And the motto?"
"Nemo me impune lacessit."
"Good!" he said.
The wine sparkled in his eyes and the bells jingled. My own fancy grew warm with the Medoc. We had passed through long walls of piled skeletons, with casks and puncheons intermingling, into the inmost recesses of the catacombs. I paused again, and this time I made bold to seize Fortunato by an arm above the elbow.
"The nitre!" I said; "see, it increases. It hangs like moss upon the vaults. We are below the river's bed. The drops of moisture trickle among the bones. Come, we will go back ere it is too late. Your cough --"
"It is nothing," he said; "let us go on. But first, another draught of the Medoc."
I broke and reached him a flagon of De Grave. He emptied it at a breath. His eyes flashed with a fierce light. He laughed and threw the bottle upwards with a gesticulation I did not understand.
I looked at him in surprise. He repeated the movement --a grotesque one.
"You do not comprehend?" he said.
"Not I," I replied.
"Then you are not of the brotherhood."
"How?"
"You are not of the masons."
"Yes, yes," I said; "yes, yes."
"You? Impossible! A mason?"
"A mason," I replied.
"A sign," he said, "a sign."
"It is this," I answered, producing from beneath the folds of my roquelaire a trowel.
"You jest," he exclaimed, recoiling a few paces. "But let us proceed to the Amontillado."
"Be it so," I said, replacing the tool beneath the cloak and again offering him my arm. He leaned upon it heavily. We continued our route in search of the Amontillado. We passed through a range of low arches, descended, passed on, and descending again, arrived at a deep crypt, in which the foulness of the air caused our flambeaux rather to glow than flame.
At the most remote end of the crypt there appeared another less spacious. Its walls had been lined with human remains, piled to the vault overhead, in the fashion of the great catacombs of Paris. Three sides of this interior crypt were still ornamented in this manner. From the fourth side the bones had been thrown down, and lay promiscuously upon the earth, forming at one point a mound of some size. Within the wall thus exposed by the displacing of the bones, we perceived a still interior crypt or recess, in depth about four feet, in width three, in height six or seven. It seemed to have been constructed for no especial use within itself, but formed merely the interval between two of the colossal supports of the roof of the catacombs, and was backed by one of their circumscribing walls of solid granite.
It was in vain that Fortunato, uplifting his dull torch, endeavoured to pry into the depth of the recess. Its termination the feeble light did not enable us to see.
"Proceed," I said; "herein is the Amontillado. As for Luchresi --"
"He is an ignoramus," interrupted my friend, as he stepped unsteadily forward, while I followed immediately at his heels. In niche, and finding an instant he had reached the extremity of the niche, and finding his progress arrested by the rock, stood stupidly bewildered. A moment more and I had fettered him to the granite. In its surface were two iron staples, distant from each other about two feet, horizontally. From one of these depended a short chain, from the other a padlock. Throwing the links about his waist, it was but the work of a few seconds to secure it. He was too much astounded to resist. Withdrawing the key I stepped back from the recess.
"Pass your hand," I said, "over the wall; you cannot help feeling the nitre. Indeed, it is very damp. Once more let me implore you to return. No? Then I must positively leave you. But I must first render you all the little attentions in my power."
"The Amontillado!" ejaculated my friend, not yet recovered from his astonishment.
"True," I replied; "the Amontillado."
As I said these words I busied myself among the pile of bones of which I have before spoken. Throwing them aside, I soon uncovered a quantity of building stone and mortar. With these materials and with the aid of my trowel, I began vigorously to wall up the entrance of the niche.
I had scarcely laid the first tier of the masonry when I discovered that the intoxication of Fortunato had in a great measure worn off. The earliest indication I had of this was a low moaning cry from the depth of the recess. It was not the cry of a drunken man. There was then a long and obstinate silence. I laid the second tier, and the third, and the fourth; and then I heard the furious vibrations of the chain. The noise lasted for several minutes, during which, that I might hearken to it with the more satisfaction, I ceased my labours and sat down upon the bones. When at last the clanking subsided, I resumed the trowel, and finished without interruption the fifth, the sixth, and the seventh tier. The wall was now nearly upon a level with my breast. I again paused, and holding the flambeaux over the mason-work, threw a few feeble rays upon the figure within.
A succession of loud and shrill screams, bursting suddenly from the throat of the chained form, seemed to thrust me violently back. For a brief moment I hesitated, I trembled. Unsheathing my rapier, I began to grope with it about the recess; but the thought of an instant reassured me. I placed my hand upon the solid fabric of the catacombs, and felt satisfied. I reapproached the wall; I replied to the yells of him who clamoured. I re-echoed, I aided, I surpassed them in volume and in strength. I did this, and the clamourer grew still.
It was now midnight, and my task was drawing to a close. I had completed the eighth, the ninth and the tenth tier. I had finished a portion of the last and the eleventh; there remained but a single stone to be fitted and plastered in. I struggled with its weight; I placed it partially in its destined position. But now there came from out the niche a low laugh that erected the hairs upon my head. It was succeeded by a sad voice, which I had difficulty in recognizing as that of the noble Fortunato. The voice said--
"Ha! ha! ha! --he! he! he! --a very good joke, indeed --an excellent jest. We will have many a rich laugh about it at the palazzo --he! he! he! --over our wine --he! he! he!"
"The Amontillado!" I said.
"He! he! he! --he! he! he! --yes, the Amontillado. But is it not getting late? Will not they be awaiting us at the palazzo, the Lady Fortunato and the rest? Let us be gone."
"Yes," I said, "let us be gone."
"For the love of God, Montresor!"
"Yes," I said, "for the love of God!"
But to these words I hearkened in vain for a reply. I grew impatient. I called aloud --
"Fortunato!"
No answer. I called again --
"Fortunato!"
No answer still. I thrust a torch through the remaining aperture and let it fall within. There came forth in return only a jingling of the bells. My heart grew sick; it was the dampness of the catacombs that made it so. I hastened to make an end of my labour. I forced the last stone into its position; I plastered it up. Against the new masonry I re-erected the old rampart of bones. For the half of a century no mortal has disturbed them. In pace requiescat!
DEAD ON ARRIVAL
A novel excerpt
From a Tom Larkin Mystery
by
Gerald Arthur Winter
The missing girl in the Caribbean was an old story, much like a girlfriend from
my past, and one I preferred to forget; but Kay Farr’s soapy scent preceded her as I sat
in my oxblood, leather recliner with my feet up at the Manhattan condo where I worked
from home.
Kay was one of the colorful threads from my past that made up the intricate
pattern of my life’s design. On our final parting, I thought that thread was all that held
me together. We were high school sweethearts, each of us the other’s first love at
sixteen—and in the Biblical sense, but never in the backseat of a car. I can’t speak for
her, but for me, the passionate entanglement had unfolded slowly, deliberately, and with
a life-long purpose.
When Kay broke up with me in college, my head stayed unscrewed for a long
time, but losing her kept me alive during my hitch in the Gulf War. I already felt dead
. . . buried in anger and chin-deep in sand. Now, even after twenty years, her essence
seemed to creep under the door from the hallway outside my office. Her scent slithered
like a serpent smothering me in its coils and ready to swallow me whole. I got up from
the recliner, went to the door, and waited for her to ring the doorbell.
I sensed that Kay was hesitant, probably ready to change her mind and leave.
Reaching for my suit jacket hanging on the doorknob of the adjacent closet, I quickly
put it on and straightened my tie, still rumpled from my afternoon nap.
I startled Kay when I jerked the door open as if I were on my way out and
unaware of her presence. She put her hand to her quivering lips, just as I remembered
with a supple bottom lip that I used to clench gently in my teeth, like an equestrian’s
light grasp of the reins subtly guiding her.
I stared blankly at her in silence, giving her the chance to speak first. She looked
like she might faint as her eyelids fluttered, so I broke the awkward silence.
“I was just leaving to meet a client,” I said, acting as if I didn’t recognize her.
An absurd idea, since she looked as great as ever with her sleek, athletic figure filled out
only in all the right places. “My secretary is on vacation, so you’ll have to call next week
for an appointment.”
“Tom, it’s me—Kay,” she said, pausing cautiously for my reaction.
With the vision of calendar years rolling back to a time before we’d broke up, I
wanted to take her in my arms and kiss her. I didn’t want to be twenty years old again.
Hell, I didn’t even want to be forty again, but a part of me wanted her back, wanted us
back, to a time where nothing else mattered except being together.
“Of course it’s you,” I said with a smirk to put her at ease, but also to scare
her a little, just for her own good. I was poison—so she’d told me when she gave me
back the engagement ring. “I knew it was you the moment you stepped off the elevator
down the hall.”
Thrown by my remark, her eyes darted nervously back and forth.
“Do you have a surveillance camera in the hall? Is that how you knew?
Did you see me on a monitor from here?”
“No. You’re wearing the same perfume you wore the night of the prom,” I
said, grinning when her expression showed she was guilty as charged.
“Do you expect me to believe that you could smell my perfume through some
high-tech security device?”
Tapping my nose with my index finger, I confessed, “Call it what you like. It
was animal magnetism back then . . . still is. So, are you going to stand in the hallway
or come in?”
“You said you were leaving for an appointment.”
“Just playing hard to get. I tried everything else in the past, with no luck. Please,
come in.” I motioned toward the sofa. “Coffee?”
“OK. If you are.”
Entering my apartment, she clutched the collar of her spring coat as if she read
my mind, but when I furrowed my brow in protest, she unbuttoned the collar, revealing
the creased neck of a middle-aged woman.
“Still two sugars and heavy on the milk?” I asked as I put on the coffee pot.
“No. Black, but not too strong,” she said, removing her bright orange coat,
probably the latest fashion, but I wasn’t one to know or care. Revealing her trim figure,
she draped the coat over her arm and stood awkwardly in the middle of the room. “If
you prefer yours strong, just add water to mine.”
“You don’t look like a watered-down version of the girl I used to know.” She
appeared uncomfortable with my comment, her arms folded in defense. “Just drape your
coat over the sofa,” I said, rummaging through the fridge. I sniffed the milk and stifled a
gag, relieved she didn’t want any.
With my secretary on vacation, I had no one to tend to life’s details beyond the
basics of my private investigator’s existence, essentially, seek and find—lock and load.
Mona, had been away too long already. In just three days of Mona’s absence decay had
begun to settle in wherever I tread.
I called to Kay from behind the fridge door, “Sorry, I have nothing to go with the
coffee! I could order up some doughnuts or Danish if you’re hungry!”
“I’m fine, Tom,” she said as I brought the coffee on a tray and set it down in front
of her on the coffee table, chipped and stained with rings ranging from coffee to bourbon.
Running her delicate fingers around the floral patterns on the arm of the sofa, she took a
sip of coffee then hesitated to put the cup down on the table.
I grinned. “Please, Kay, by all means leave your mark.” With the old poison
coming to the surface, I said over the rim of my cup, “Your stain may be the only
memento I’ll have of our past . . . especially since they’ve torn down The Old Milk Barn
in Jersey where I’d carved Tom & Kay in one of the beams.”
Probably thinking her decision to contact me was a bad one, she froze with the
cup raised to her lips, then tears welled in her eyes. Part of me was glad—payback for all
the pain I’d felt over losing her—even though so long ago when I was still a stranger to
the marred spirit who now possessed me. You might see me in the bright Caribbean sun
at noon, but the darkness of my past would still chill you to the core. Some women may
have mistaken me for a Renaissance man, but the contrasts of lights and shadows of my
checkered past were not the artistic chiaroscuro of a Rembrandt.
“I’m not here for the reason you probably think,” she said. “This isn’t about us
. . . there is no us. This is business . . . important painful business . . . something crucial
to a dear friend who needs your professional help.”
I put down my cup and took a deep breath to regain the wind she knocked out of
me. My imagination of any rekindled flame between us momentarily flickered then died.
I snapped angrily, “You could’ve just called me for that without putting me
through this agonizing exercise in futility. I’m in the book and have a Website, so your
boyfriend didn’t need your intercession to reach me.”
“Girlfriend, Tom. My roommate from college has a desperate situation,” she
scolded me with a glare that asked—Can you still be jealous after all these years?
“Sally?” I asked, remembering her roommate from Douglass College, but what
stuck in my mind most was Sally’s disapproval of me. “No wonder she sent you as her
emissary; she’d rather die than come to me for help.”
“It must be obvious why you’re her last resort,” Kay said with puppy eyes, but
nothing registered. “Her tragedy’s been dragged through the news for so long.”
“Sorry, Kay. You’ve lost me. I’ve seen nothing in the news about Sally Heidt,”
I said, but realized that was her maiden name. Still, I came up empty. “I guess Sally
must be married . . . poor bastard, whoever her husband is.”
“And you’re a detective?” she said, seeming to enjoy watching me squirm in my
misery of self-pity over lost opportunities. Then she atoned with reassurance. “Yes, she
married then divorced. Her married name is Simon, but her daughter’s last name is from
Sally’s first husband, Sandler . . . her daughter is Joy Sandler.”
I felt foolish and flattered at the same time—foolish because Joy Sandler had
been missing for years and everyone had their opinion about who might have killed her
—flattered because someone believed I could help when everyone else had given up.
“I’m sorry for her loss,” I said with a shrug. “I never made that connection . . .
didn’t even recognize her from all those news interviews. She hasn’t held up as well as
you over time.”
“Her physical deterioration started about five years ago after the first anniversary
of Joy’s disappearance,” Kay said, slumping her shoulders. “We were like sisters before
that, but her loss took the life out of her.”
“What can I possibly do at this point except give Sally false hope? The FBI, the
Colombian National Police, and Isla Rameras locals exhausted all their suspects, and
if she’d been dumped at sea, if anything was going to wash up, it would’ve long ago.”
“I just need you to try. That’s all.” Kay put her hand on my arm. “This could give
her closure, knowing you ran through it all just one more time on her behalf.”
“I sympathize, but if I do anything at all, it won’t be for Sally and it won’t be for
you,” I assured her. “Is the half-million still in the pot?”
“What?” she stood up from the sofa and scolded. “Of course! That money has
been in escrow for years, but I need to know you’ll take this case for a better reason than
the reward. This is personal!”
“It’s personal for me too,” I assured her. “This is for Joy. If Sally expects me to
move mountains to find her daughter, I’ll need that pot to do what’s necessary. If I find
Joy alive, or bring her murderer to justice, it’ll cost a half mil.”
“What makes you think Sally has that kind of money?”
“I seem to recall her first husband was a retired cop,” I said with a smirk. “Ray
Sandler was shot in the line of duty, but while on disability, he won the New York Mega
Millions lottery worth about fifty million after taxes. I seem to recall that a Sally Sandler
appealed for a fifty per cent settlement on that fortune in divorce court.”
Kay’s nose wrinkled with repugnance. She’d learned from experience that the
havoc of the poison I wreaked, though odorless and colorless, was still deadly when
the fumes caught anyone off guard.
“I have no authority,” Kay said with obvious disappointment in her expression.
“I’ll have to tell Sally what you want.”
“What I want . . . is to find her daughter alive. That’s all she needs to know,”
When the money is in my account, I’m hers till I find Joy or whoever killed her.”
“With so much money, Tom, where would you start?” Kay asked as I helped her
on with her coat.
Leading her to the door then opening it for her exit, I said, “When it comes to
murder, I always follow the blood.”
“Will you fly to Isla Rameras?”
“The blood starts here in the U.S.A.”
“Where?”
“In New Jersey.”
“I don’t get it, Tom.”
“Joy’s blood father is a high roller in Atlantic City.”
“I don’t think Sally knows that. They’ve had no contact for years. How do you
know?”
“We ex-cops have our own network.”
“You suspect Joy’s father?”
“Not particularly, but no one ever followed that trail. Time to look in other
directions where somebody might not have covered his or her tracks. I don’t know what
the motive could be yet, but maybe in someone’s mind, when Joy Sandler arrived in Isla
Rameras, she was already dead on arrival.
______________________
Ray Sandler wasn’t the type to lay low. He’d publicly put up the half-million
dollar reward to find his daughter, so I felt no guilt about asking his ex-wife to cough up
the same amount to give me a jump-start. I had no personal connection to Ray, but when
I was being processed in Hackensack for back vacation and sick pay due to me from my
switchover from New Jersey law enforcement to DEA, Ray was in the news about his
disability from a shoot-out at a bank heist in Teaneck that ended on the New Jersey
Turnpike.
Ray shot both bank robbers after a high-speed chase that resulted in his killing
both culprits in the cattail swamps of the Meadowlands. Ray had state troopers for back-
up when his partner was killed in the shootout. All of this was public knowledge when it
happened, but then resurfaced in the media when his daughter disappeared almost seven
years ago. I’d never made the connection to his ex-wife, my high school sweetheart’s best
friend, Sally Heidt when I knew her.
Since the only abduction case I ever worked on was my niece’s, I was relieved
that Joy Sandler wasn’t kin. Still, the tie to Kay Farr was enough to make it worse. My
first resolution was to assume Joy was alive. Not easy, considering the history, so I
convinced myself that she’d vanished yesterday, and that I was bringing the news to
her father for the first time. With the five hundred grand wired to my bank account that
morning, I could convince myself of many things.
As Neptune was to Asbury Park, seeking a new identity on the outskirts, Margate,
was to Atlantic City, and hadn’t caught up to the casino boom as it remained in transition
as a place where much of the ethnic minority, casino hired-help humbly resided.
Not a gambler, my only connection to Atlantic City was the Steel Pier. When I
was kid, the Miss America Pageant every September was my only other link to AC that I
could still look back on with a smile. Perhaps Ray Sandler was always a gambler, but I
couldn’t fathom the thinking of a man who, after hitting the long shot of the Mega
Millions jackpot, would spend the next decade throwing away even a dime of it back to
the casinos.
Though the concept of a high roller’s lifestyle escaped me, I was told by friends
who enjoyed recreational gambling that high rollers combined a rare combination of
natural luck and perks—freebies on the house. Many a wannabe high roller bit the dust
and ransomed their souls in the process, so the real McCoy was a curiosity I looked
forward to meeting.
As I headed south at 8 a.m. Ventnor Avenue displayed shops on the east side
with a few boarded-up windows with For Rent signs displayed. Pastel-colored high-rise
condos lined the west side facing the bay. I turned left off Ventnor onto Benson where
Mexican day laborers lined up at a Spanish mission. At the end of the short block, I
turned right, heading south on Atlantic Avenue, the main drag along the beach front
where I caught a glimpse of a National Historic Site, the statue of Lucy the Elephant.
Sizing up the neighborhood, I figured Ray must’ve done well for himself by
buying his home when the area was worth half its current value. With the price of gas, it
was probably cheaper for him to hail a cab to the casino, and also to drink as many free
cocktails as he wished without worry about a DUI heading home.
I parked on the opposite side of the street of Sandler’s home as my GPS let me
know I’d arrived at my destination.
“Will there be anything else, Mr. Larkin?” the female version of Hal inquired, like
in 2001 Space Odyssey.
“No, thanks but I look forward to the future when you can just beam me up to my
destination. Have a great day.”
“You, too, Mr. Larkin.”
Ray Sandler’s address disappeared from my radio screen. I got out of my car and
ambled slowly across the street, which was quiet with little traffic just before the beach
season started. The locals needed less than ten minutes to get to work at the casinos. It
appeared that Sandler recently added a second floor to the original structure of his home,
so I assumed he still prospered from his gambling.
The house was probably worth three million a few years ago, but even with the
addition, worth less than two million since the recent real estate debacle. I wondered if
that bothered a high roller, or if the mentality of a gambler even considered the nuances
of risk leveraging. When I leaned on the doorbell, after a few seconds, I had half my
answer standing in the open doorway.
She was about thirty-five with a perfect, though freckled, tan that accented the
long blond hair, natural and flowing—a rarity. Her big hazel eyes seemed to take me in
with a severity that was a bit unnerving. There was a long silence between our mutual
assessments before she cocked her head in a gesture for me to state my business.
“Tom Larkin. I’m a private investigator and need to speak to Ray in regard to his
missing daughter . . . Joy.”
“You vant to shpeak vit Raymont?” she asked with a whistling accent that seemed
to drip with sauerkraut.
I kept my heels from clicking together as I said, “Ya.”
“Vat iz your namp again?”
“Tom Larkin. Tell him I’m a former cop, like him.”
“Vait here, Mr. Larkin. I vill ask if he vill see you.”
When she turned to get Ray, she left the door open, so I stepped in and watched
from the foyer as she climbed an open staircase to the second floor. She wore a lime
green thong bikini, which gave me a vision of ping pong balls tumbling for a lottery
drawing as her butt cheeks, bisected by a thin green line, rotated with her ascent. I
wondered if Ray kept her around as a good luck charm just to remind him of the Mega
Millions bonanza he’d won.
From the foyer, I heard Ray ranting, “What the hell, Astrid! I don’t wanna see
anybody before I go to the casino. Bad—fucking--karma!” Then there was a long silence
and I saw Ray on the second floor landing tying his paisley silk bathrobe as he tried to
identify me from a distance without his glasses, which he put on as he lumbered in his
awkward descent toward me.
“I’m sorry to disturb you so early in the day, Mr. Sandler,” I said in formal mode.
“But your ex-wife has hired me to assist in the case of your missing daughter, Joy.”
“Ya gotta be—fucking—kiddin’ me?” he said, pulling a crumpled pack of
cigarettes from his bathrobe pocket and lighting one with a lighter that looked like 24
karat gold. “It’s been what—six, almost seven years? We all need to move on. What
does Sally think anyone can do at this point. This is nuts!”
“Then why do you continue to keep the half-million-dollar reward posted on the
internet?”
“Because I can afford to—that’s why!” Ray said proudly, as his pock-marked
cheeks turned red. “It’s a long shot, but worth the gamble to get Joy back . . . or at least
to see that her killers burn in hell.”
“So you think she’s dead?”
“I’m a gambler . . . so let’s just say, at this point, I wouldn’t bet on her being
alive.”
He took a long drag on his bent cigarette then peered over the top of his cheapo
magnifying specs to assess me from two ranges. When he came closer, the stench of
stale cologne and sweat closed my throat with a defensive gag.
“Where the fuck do I know you from?” he grimaced. “You we’re a cop too,
right?” I nodded. “Yeah, I caught your drift from the second floor. I suppose if I
hadn’t made my big score, I’d be a shamus just like you.”
“I don’t think just like me. I’m one of kind. That’s why your ex hired me.”
He motioned toward the staircase behind him. “A year ago I thought Astrid was
one of a kind, but I’m already tired of screwin’ her. I had a bald chick before her. I used
to rub her head before each draw at the table, my good luck charm. When I start to break
even, the charm’s over. I’m feelin’ the need for a redhead soon to sway the tide back in
my favor.”
“Personally, I’m 0 for 2 with redheads,” I said. “and not looking for strike three.”
Ray nodded in appreciation.
“Will you answer a few questions?”
“What the hell. I’m not due at the tables till noon. I got in at four o’clock this
morning, so I’m not focussed. Have a seat. Coffee?”
I nodded.
“Astrid, bring us some java!” he shouted, as I sat at the end of a sofa and he in
a tan, suede recliner. He cranked the chair open, making me feel like a proctologist with
a view of his stained tighty-whities and varicose veins on his hairy thighs.
From the landing above us, Astrid snapped, “Iv you tink you cant replace me vit a
redhet, you are mistakent, Raymont!”
“Ya! Ya!” Ray smirked. “Just bring the damn coffee, weiner schnitzel!” Aside to
me, he said, “Sometimes these Heinies forget we won the fuckin’ war . . . both of ’em.”
“Where’d you find her?” I asked. “I must say, she’s stunning.”
“Believe me, her looks ain’t the half of it. She could suck a cherrystone out of its
shell without opening it.”
That image wavered briefly in my mind as I thought about my client, Ray’s
ex-wife, Sally. Whatever attracted that stuck-up cheerleader to this bum? His ship
hadn’t come in until after it was all over between them. Sally must’ve been bitter about
Ray’s bonanza since she’d tried to increase her alimony when his winning the lottery hit
the news. But after she remarried, money wasn’t an issue between them because her
current husband had even bigger bucks than Ray, from mining diamonds.
Except for the loss of her daughter, I couldn’t feel sorry for Sally. Then again, I
never liked her in the first place. In college, I thought of Sally as a greyhound; though a
sleek pedigree at a glance, she was basically a fast bitch right out of the gate. Could this
mismatch have spawned the fate of a tragic end for their daughter Joy?
“You’ve got a great life for a retired cop with a bum leg, Ray,” I said, seeing no
reason to keep up the formalities since he felt comfortable enough with me to reveal his
current companion’s intimate skills.
“It’s a livin’ . . . a damn good livin’!” he said with a phlegmatic laugh and a
cough as he lit another cigarette. “So whaddaya want from me?”
“I want to know your gut feeling about Joy’s disappearance . . . not as her
father, but as a cop.”
“I wasn’t much a cop when it came to investigations,” he shrugged with a
slap of his beer gut gradually emerging from his bathrobe, which loosened at the ties
with every gesture of his hands. The hairy globe looked like the top of a baby’s head
emerging from the womb. “I was good at the chase when I knew I had my perp dead
to rites. Knowing I could shoot to kill was a perk.”
“Like when you tracked down the bank robbers in the Meadowlands and took
a shot in the leg,” I offered, watching his round face morph to a friendly, sallow-toothed
grin. I assumed that I touched on Ray’s personal evaluation of that incident, which had
been less positively assessed by the department. There had been a rumor that, after the
culprits were bogged down in the swamp grass, Ray had disarmed one then shot himself
in the leg with the perpetrator’s weapon just to get the early retirement disability and a
commendation with a pay boost to the next grade. That was the buzz inside the department,
but the blue wall never let it reach the public.
“You heard about that in the papers, huh?” he said, rubbing the mound of his
belly.” I got an interview on TV with Geraldo, too.”
“I saw it,” I said. “The disability has put thirty pounds on you since then.”
“And the good life from the Mega Millions,” he coughed as he lit, yet another
cigarette. “You’re the shamus. What should I have done as a cop that I couldn’t do as a
father?”
“Did you try to be objective . . . for Joy’s sake?” I asked, baiting him to get a feel
for what his emotional attachment was for Joy other than the genetic connection.
His smile turned into a pensive sneer. I wasn’t certain if his reflective pause
was the predecessor to the relief of a fart, or if something other than a roulette wheel
was actually spinning to some conclusion inside his head. When he answered, I was
caught off guard.
“Objective?” he blurted. “What kind of sick fuck are you? I take it you have no
kids, or you’re just one truly cold bastard! But I’m thinking—both.”
“Take it easy, Ray.” I held up a hand, wondering if he might get up and throw a
punch at me. “Just testing. You pass . . . you love Joy . . . and all this schmaltz is your
way of creating a shell around your hurt . . .”
He put out his cigarette with a violent gesture that sent the crystal ashtray
sliding across the coffee table and clanking on the hardwood floor with an echo that
brought the Valkyrie to the second flood landing.
“Is everythink, okay, Raymont?” she called, her voice echoing from above and her
slender hand waving a 9mm pistol over the banister.
“Ya-ya!” he shouted. “She’s also my bodyguard.”
“Nice multitasking,” I said, waving Asrid off, but when I turned back to Ray, he
covered his face with one hand and wept. Slowly, he raised his head, showed me his
tearful eyes, and said, “You’ve got no respect for the dead. Get the fuck out of my house!”
I departed with mixed emotions, hating what it took to get my answer, but glad
for the feeling that Ray wasn’t capable of collusion to knowingly harm his daughter.
Yet, a final glance toward the second-floor landing made me wonder about the complici-
ties of Joy’s disappearance, and how third parties might take advantage of the stressed
emotions of a gambler, especially if his luck turned sour. The cold stare from Astrid on
the landing made me think her relationship with Ray had an ulterior motive that trans-
cended the flesh.
As I returned to my car and started the engine, I took my mini-binoculars
from the glove compartment and scanned the second-story windows of Ray Sandler’s
beach house. I paused at the largest window that led to a balcony, probably used for
viewing sunsets on the bay. The bright sun betrayed a shadow behind the laced curtains,
where I saw Astrid staring back at me with a pair of binoculars of her own.
I put down my binoculars for a moment, cocked my head and opened my mouth
with a swirl of my tongue. When I raised my binoculars to see her response, I saw her
put the 9 mm pistol with an extended silencer into her mouth and fellate the inside of her
right cheek.
Yes. There was more to Miss Germany than met the eye. I was certain I’d need
to encounter Astrid again. I wondered how I’d go about disarming her and replacing
that pistol with a weapon of my own, and if it would have enough impact to stop her
cold.
Meantime, I needed to head north to Bergen County to talk to Tracy Hoffman,
Joy Sandler’s best friend, who’d last seen her alive before Joy vanished. From Tracy’s
news photos six years ago, I saw that she was a looker, but still under the age limit, even
for my prurient interests. I figured the prospects of encountering two beautiful women in
one day was my only perk on the long drive north.
Later near the end of the three-hour drive back north to Bergen County, what
stunned me, suddenly distracting me from Tracy Hoffman’s sallow newspaper photo,
was a CBS radio newscast, announcing that a former Mega Millions winner, depressed
from his gambling losses in Atlantic City the night before, had just plunged to his death
from the balcony of his high roller’s suite at the Taj Mahal casino.
I felt bad for Ray Sandler, mostly because he’d been a cop, bad or otherwise.
Cops mourn for their own regardless of the circumstances. He was at his peak when I
saw him a few hours ago, so I had to wonder—with his only daughter still missing and
presumed dead, and he remaining divorced and single—who were Ray’s beneficiaries?
Regardless, my entry into this cold case had apparently struck a nerve with someone,
at least giving me a glimmer of hope that Joy Sandler might still be alive.
____________
An excerpt from
THE BLINDSPOT
A novel
by
Gerald Arthur Winter
“The ball flew at him and he was conscious of
its bird-form and white flapping wings, until
it suddenly disappeared from view.”
Bernard Malamud – The Natural © 1952
***
Somewhere Children Shout
Two months had slipped by since we met with the attorney, Wally Zimmerman.
Wally’s discouragement about my chances of ever playing in the majors had been a
mental setback for Pop. Though he’d slipped back into drinking Friday and Saturday
nights, I continued practicing my pitching without him.
Gramps had dropped me off at home after church. Coming out of my room, I
walked past Pop’s open bedroom door. With a Sunday hangover, Pop woke, but still
half asleep and squinting at his alarm clock to see it was noon. When his iPhone buzzed,
he stretched from his bed and stumbled to answer it across the room on the dresser.
Thinking I’d continued to go downstairs, he grabbed his phone, but I paused in
the hallway outside his door to listen. He put his iPhone on speaker so he could set it on
the dresser and get dressed as he spoke.
“Am I speaking to Mr. Swift?” a woman’s voice asked.
“Yeah,” Pop said, pulling on his jeans then sitting on the bed to put on his socks.
I showed my face in the doorway. He started to wave me away to go practice my pitching,
but I remained listening, knowing from Pop’s clueless expression that it wasn’t Gram
calling.
“Hello, Mr. Swift. I’m calling about your daughter, Bonnie—” the voice said.
“Who’s this?”
“I’m sorry to call you unexpectedly, but I’m on Pacific Time, and I needed to
contact you right away.”
“What for?”
“I saw a video of Bonnie’s pitching performance at a New York Yankees fund-
raiser. I want you and Bonnie to fly to LA tomorrow, all expenses paid.”
“Is this one of you jokers from The Beachcomber?” he asked, “I don’t need you
drunken bozos making it any tougher for Bonnie than it already is.”
He hung up and lay back on his bed, but saw me staring at him from the doorway.
I lifted a tray that I’d set down in the hallway to serve him breakfast in bed, hoping to
soothe his hangover, a Sunday ritual I’d become accustomed to. Though I’d shrugged
off my disappointment over my Yankee Stadium performance, I knew Pop hadn’t, far
from it. I set the tray on the night table and gave him a sympathetic grin with a tilt of
my head.
“Everything okay, Pop?”
His phone rang again.
He grabbed it and said, “Knock it off, will ya! I suppose you’re gonna tell me
the Dodgers want to sign Bonnie?”
My mouth dropped open.
“I don’t care,” she said. “The Dodgers would be fine—any team.”
The woman on the phone said, “I wish my invitation were that exciting. I want
you both to appear on my show on Monday . . . this is Avida Ropas. . . from the TV talk
show, Avida Live.”
Dumbfounded, Pop stood from his bed.
“Mr. Swift . . . are you still there?” her voice crackled with static.
“Yes,” he said. “Why would we want to go on your show?”
“Bonnie struck out Julio Baquero at Yankee Stadium. That’s a big deal.”
“How’d you know that?” Pop huffed.
“I told you, someone put it on YouTube. She’s had over ten million hits on the
site, more and more every day. I want people to know Bonnie’s inside story . . . your
being a single parent and her coach.”
“Who told you that?”
“Wally Zimmerman is my agent. He suggested I book you on my show.”
“I told him we weren’t interested in that kind of exposure. Bonnie’s barely twelve
years old.”
“I know, Mr. Swift—but I’ll give her the chance to show her talent to my twenty
million viewers—live. Maybe someone from Major League Baseball will take notice of
her unusual skill.”
“Let’s go, Pop! I want to do it!” I shouted across the room.
“OK, just this once. We’ll give it a shot. But I’m not letting Bonnie out of my
sight. I trust you only because we’ve met Wally and I think he’s honest—for a lawyer.
But I don’t know the people around you. Bonnie’s a minor and the only family I’ve got.”
“I understand, Mr. Swift. A limousine will pick you up at home tomorrow morn-
ing at nine o’clock. Pack light. You’ll be home Monday night so you can go back to
work and Bonnie can go back to school on Tuesday. Can you get the time off on such
short notice?”
“We’ll call in sick,” Pop said with a wink at me.
“Are you ill?” Avida asked
He waved me over for a hug and said, “Not now, but we will be tomorrow.”
When he hung up, I hovered waiting to hear the details. “You’re going to pitch on TV,”
he said. “I suppose it couldn’t hurt this once . . . twenty million viewers.”
My green eyes widened the way my mom’s must have the first time Pop had
kissed her when they were only eleven years old. Gram had told me about that fifth-grade
incident. “I won’t disappoint you this time, Pop.”
“You never have,” he said as we hugged. “Thanks for making breakfast, but I’m
up for the day. Let’s eat in the kitchen. ”
“Wow, Pop! California!”
“At Yankee Stadium, I’d made a bad pitch call.”
“I won’t give major leaguers a break at bat like I gave Jimmy Stattler.”
Pop nodded. “OK. Let’s show ’em no mercy.”
I gave him a high-five that sent a static shock through our hands with a loud
snap. Pop seemed surprised that I could hit back so hard. I made a fist and felt Junior’s
strength pulsing through my veins. My twin brother who died at birth had become
part of my daily fiber.
* * *
In the limousine on the way to Newark Airport, I stared out the window in
Elizabeth, New Jersey and saw the depressing site that all out-of-state and foreign
travelers see: Oil storage tanks and high-voltage generators flanked the Jersey Turnpike
for miles. Cranes and pulleys had flashing lights through the gray, smoggy meadow-
lands. It seemed like a foreign country, nothing like the Pine Barrens near the ocean
where the air was fresh with salty breezes.
The pollution gagged me, already nervous before my first flight and the TV
exposure in LA. I grabbed Pop’s arm, and he turned to see my tearing, bloodshot
eyes. He grabbed the bag tucked in the pocket in back of the seat in front of me.
Choking and retching, I threw up into the bag. Pop held my head down. My long
blond hair in damp ringlets hung limply around his grasp, tight at first, like trying
to hold onto something he feared he’d lose. Then, with his thumbs around the back
of my ears, he caressed my neck, slowly bringing me back to him.
“Sorry, Pop.” I blew my nose in a tissue and wiped away the tears running
down my cheeks with the back of my hand.
“That’s, okay,” Pop said, rubbing my back. “Do you want to forget about
this and go home?” He raised his arm to knock on the protective glass to get the
driver’s attention.
I grabbed his wrist. “No way!,” I said. “The air stinks here. That’s all.”
“It could be worse in LA.”
“No worse than your stinky old catcher’s mitt,” I kidded.
He tickled my stomach the same way he had since I was seven years old,
which made me laugh that high-shrilled shriek that Gramps called infectious.
The driver turned on his intercom with a crackle. “We’re almost at the terminal.”
“Could you turn on the recycled air so we don’t get any of that pollution from
outside?” Jack asked.
“No problem.”
Pop gave me a stick of mint gum.
I leaned back, gave him a nod, and said, “I’m over it.”
My expression, which he’d learned to read as well as he’d read my mother’s,
confirmed my claim. He realized I had woven within my fiber what it would take—I
had heart.
As we left Newark for LA, we couldn’t be sure if this unique opportunity could
help my chances of playing in the majors or not. Pop feared some major league front
offices might even frown upon it, solidifying their adamant attitude toward a woman
breaking the invisible, unspoken gender-line at the major-league level.
At the window seat beside him, I clutched my baseball mitt in my lap. My
Yankee baseball cap tipped askew as I slumped with my cheek pressed against the
window. I thought about becoming a major league pitcher someday, even for the
Dodgers. I knew only what Gramps had told me about their leaving Brooklyn when
he was a kid—traitors, he’d called them.
I felt Pop’s hands covering me with a blanket. I turned to him with a smile then
nestled down and drifted off in slumber with my ear against his chest. His heartbeat’s
cadence was in counterpoint to the hum of the jet engines. I heard my brother Junior’s
voice with a repetitive cadence, Dodger blue or Yankee pinstripes. Junior and I were
always on the same page.
* * *
From our four-star accommodations and the stretch-limo ride to the TV studio,
I remained in silent awe. Though impressed, Pop seemed anxious about my pitching in
front of millions of television viewers.
“You okay?” he kept asking me.
“I’m fine. Don’t worry,” I said, but that didn’t seem to comfort him.
My make-up session highlighted my day. I puckered my lips for a light touch of
lipstick and the soft brush against my cheeks gave them some blush.
“Knock ’em dead,” the make-up artist told me, removing the sheet from my neck
and brushing aside one dangling, blond lock from my forehead.
“You bet,” I said, rising from the soft chair. “I like it this way,” I said, swiping
that lock of hair back just above my eye. “It could distract some heavy hitters.”
The make-up artist shook her head with,“Mmh-mmh-mmh, a girl’s gotta do what
a girl’s gotta do.”
Her comment made me grin, but behind my smile I felt discomfort. I felt silly
wearing makeup, but wasn’t sure if it was because I was so young or if it had to do with
how Junior felt about it. Sometimes his utter silence told me he was embarrassed by
whatever I was doing.
My smile and interaction with the hairstylist drew Pop’s attention. I figured
I reminded him of my mom, Lydia, when they were kids. That made him smile, but
just briefly. When I turned to face him directly, Pop’s smile faded into his serious
pitching coach mode that said—show time.
* * *
Avida introduced me and Pop to her live studio audience with applause, hoots
and whistles. Arms pumping, they stood up from their seats as if it were a cafeteria
food fight. They were mostly people of color, Blacks, Chicanos, and Asians with gruff,
inner-city accents. Attire was less than casual with bare mid-drifts, short-shorts, and
top-and-bottom cleavage. As usual, Avida’s audience was raucous.
Pop watched me closely for any ill-effects, but I’d have to get used to this kind of
exposure. Fans would get in my face in a major league stadium where tempers flared and
loyalties were worn on spectators’ sleeves. It was like tossing me into the ocean to see if
I’d swim or drown. I sat between Pop and Avida.
Avida asked him, “Should I call you Coach?”
“I assume you’re over twenty-one, so you can call me Jack.”
“Just barely, Jack.”
The studio audience responded with intermittent laughter, enjoying our banter.
With occasional shout-outs from the audience, the interview covered the tragedy of our
losses, my mom and twin brother at birth, Pop’s single parenting, and our high hopes to
have a major league team show interest in my unique pitching style.
“Why don’t you want her to play Little League as many other girls have? Mo’neˊ
Davis got much attention in Little League with a Sports Illustrated cover shot.”
“Mo’neˊ got much attention because she could pitch as well as the boys whom she
was competing against,” Pop said. “Bonnie isn’t as good as boys her own age—she’s
much better—even better than high school boys I’ve coached. ”
The audience booed. Others grumbled with a dull roar of heckling.
Pop shrugged. “She’s a natural.”
“We have a lot of doubters in the audience,” Avida said.
“We’ll bide our time until Bonnie’s ready for college—and Major League Base-
ball is ready for her.” Pop said.
“Sounds like you’ve got the American dream and her pursuit of happiness on
hold,” Avida said. “But while you’re waiting, maybe I can give Bonnie’s future career
a boost with a live demonstration. How about it, audience? Shall we make Jack put
Bonnie’s talent where his mouth is?”
Many stood and pumped their fists as they hooted.
“We’re gonna give Bonnie a chance to strut her stuff !” Avida shrilled, then she
hushed the crowd and said to me. “I’m sure you know who Cesar Montego is.”
I shook my head as the audience chanted, “Mon-te-go! Mon-te-go!”
“No? Oh, I forgot. Bonnie’s never been to California. I’ll bet Jack knows who
Montego is.”
“He’s the National League Batting Champion from the LA Dodgers,” he said.
When Avida turned to me, I said, “I don’t know any Dodgers. We’re Yankee
fans.”
The audience booed, but I shrugged it off.
“Let’s introduce Bonnie to Cesar Mon-te-e-e-e-ego!”
The audience chanted louder, “Mon-te-go! Mon-te-go! Mon-te-go!”
Wearing his Dodger uniform, Cesar waved his blue cap to the audience, then
exchanged hugs with Avida and shook our hands.
“We’re thrilled to have you with us today, Cesar,” Avida said. “We come from
the same block in the barrio, so—Tenemos la misma sangre—we be blood, bro.” More
cheers and hoots came, but she waved to hush the audience. “Tell us why you’re here
today, Cesar.”
“You sent me a video of this young girl pitching at Yankee Stadium. Maybe
because she struck out Julio Baquero, Bonnie and her papi think she can strike me out,
too. I say—not a chance!”
The audience reacted with mixed cheers and boos.
“What do you think, Bonnie?” Avida asked.
“Is he as good as Jimmy Stattler?”
“Who’s that, honey?”
“A boy from my school.”
The audience became hysterical and Avida’s mascara ran from tears of laughter.
Pop understood my naïve comparison, but I read concern from his expression,
wondering if exposing me to this harangue was a mistake.
“Cesar Montego is no boy from your school, Bonnie. He led the majors in hits
with 221 and a .363 batting average this past season. What do you think of that?”
I shrugged, smirked at Pop, and said, “If he bunts, he might get lucky.”
The audience exploded with my response as Avida announced, “Come back after
the break to see if Bonnie Swift can back up her claim when she throws ten pitches to
Cesar Montego—a boy from my school—the streets of East LA.”
* * *
On her nationally syndicated television show, Avida arranged for an outdoor
batting cage and had a National League umpire calling balls and strikes for Cesar
Montego’s challenge. The news media showed up, but only because Avida had alerted
them that she was featuring Cesar Montego batting against a child prodigy. Most thought
it was just a prank or a publicity stunt, so they sent only freelance crews, treating the
broadcast as a sideshow just to boost Avida’s ratings during Sweeps Week. The media
showed more interest in the batting champ than in me.
My grandparents watched from home as did Pop’s cronies at his bar hang-outs
on the boardwalk at the Jersey shore. Pop had told our school principal why we’d be absent,
so many viewed the show from classrooms back in our hometown, Surf Ville.
As usual, Pop called my pitches. On a bright sunny day with little smog-effect, I
prepared to pitch to Montego in the studio’s parking lot. The audience remained in the
studio watching on a wide-screen, but Montego’s appearance drew passersby for a closer
view, hoping to get his autograph.
I threw five warm-up lobs then two moderate fastballs before Montego finished
stretching and came to the plate. A volunteer minor league catcher squatted behind
Montego. Pop set up pitching signs with the catcher so no pitches would injure him.
The catcher laughed off Pop’s concern that my pitches could harm him.
“Like playing catch with my nine-year-old son,” he said aside, assessing my
warm-up pitches.
Pop warned me that Montego wasn’t a slugger like the Yankees’ Julio Baquero,
but rather a spray hitter with great vision and a quick bat. He told me that my glib
response to Montego’s challenge was accurate—he just might get a hit with a bunt he
could beat out, especially squared off at the plate with a better view of my pitch.
A smart hitter, Montego never took pitchers for granted. He would take many
pitches just for a look, which helped him lead the majors in walks. Pop told me that
when Montego retired, he’d surely enter the Hall of Fame on the first round. That
didn’t faze me.
Commentating, Avida stood off-camera: “There’s Bonnie’s wind-up I’d heard
about, so graceful and—the pitch! Montego takes it for strike one. He doesn’t seem
impressed by what he saw. He’s shaking his head with a smile and digging in again.
“Bonnie checks Jack for the sign. She winds up and—whoa! Montego fouls it
back. The speed monitor said Bonnie’s first pitch was 70 mph, but this one was 77 mph.
He probably regrets taking that first pitch for a strike. The second pitch must’ve fooled
him with a speed he wasn’t expecting. Jack looks like he wasn’t expecting it either.
Montego’s in a hole with two strikes, but he still looks confident, as if he’s just toying
with Bonnie.”
Pop came to the mound to talk to me. “This is a ten-pitch contest, not three
pitches. It’s a fifty-fifty chance whether you’re throwing heat or a change-up. That
last one was the fastest pitch you’ve throw. Don’t burn yourself out. He plays the
percentages and wins more times than not.”
I nodded, listening to every word as I glared at Montego.
Pop said, “He must have heard rumors about your tricky pitch, so he’ll be antici-
pating it. He hasn’t seen your curve, so he figures there’s a good chance your next pitch,
no matter how it moves, will be slow enough for him to hold back for a look. So what’ll
you throw?”
“Heat on the inside corner.”
“Do it.”
Avida resumed: “After a talk with Jack, Bonnie looks ready. She seems calm
and—wow! She threw it right by him before he could blink and at . . . 79 mph! She
struck him out! Montego claims the pitch was high and he’s giving the ump some heat.
If this were for real, an ump would be tossing him out of the game.”
Hovering in my mind was the image of Babe Ruth complaining to the umpire
about his call-strike three on Jackie Mitchell’s curve when a girl had struck out the
Babe in an exhibition game. I tightened my jaw to keep from laughing at Montego
who’d been caught flat-footed on my pitch.
Avida said, “OK. He’s back in the batter’s box, lefty against lefty, which should
give the pitcher an edge, but Montego’s average is over three hundred against lefties
and righties. We could be witnessing today’s best hitter against a future best pitcher.
“I’m getting mixed opinions about her last pitch from the studio audience, and a
crowd is beginning to gather in the parking lot. Some claim the last pitch was high while
others say it was a strike. Regardless, that’s one out. No do-overs in this match-up.”
Pop came to the mound again. “We need to use reverse psychology,” he said, just
loud enough for Montego to hear, then he whispered, “Double-reverse.”
“You mean like the double-negative you taught me not to say in English?” He
nodded as my mind turned. I whispered, “Two negatives make a positive—you want the
the same pitch?”
He winked.
Avida reported, “Jack’s coming off the mound and Bonnie’s ready, but Montego’s
bearing down. Let’s see who gets outsmarted this time.
“Here she goes and—yoiks! She slipped it by him again! He swung late! A whiff
across the letters at 80 mph—too fast if you’re not expecting it—especially from a sixth-
grader.”
Montego looked distraught, but he genuflected and dug in.
Pop didn’t come to the mound this time and just gave me his signal. I nodded,
and went into my wind-up. Though I’d rarely used it, I was going to throw a slider Pop
had added to my repertoire. I gripped the ball with three fingers: my pointer just off the
top laces, my abnormally-long middle finger dug into the top laces, and the ball of my
thumb on the bottom laces. My ring finger and pinkie were off the ball, but together gave
balance to the other three gripping fingers to give the ball a snapping movement, slower
than a fastball—quicker than a curve.
My adjustments on speed and movement of the ball were not at the major league
ratios, because my fastball was still averaging under 80 mph The ball came fast enough,
and letter high, but quickly dropped knee-high just inside the strike zone. The pitch
caught Montego off guard, obviously expecting another high fastball. It was, but only
for ninety percent of the distance to the plate. He swung over the slider for strike two.
Slumping his shoulders, Montego’s pride was waning.
Avida continued her commentary: “No telling what Bonnie will throw next. I
sure don’t know. Montego doesn’t know, and maybe Bonnie doesn’t know yet either,
because Jack is going out to the mound for a chat.”
Pop bent close to me as I shielded our faces with my cap.
“This would be a great time for the switcheroo, but it’s not the final out,” Jack
said. “Even if we get this strike, we have another out to go. We need to save your best
pitch for when it’s going to be most effective. That’s a rule I want you to stick to. You’re
a great pitcher even without it. You’ve been practicing that outside-in curve for more
than a year. Give it your best shot.”
Pop’s words sounded tried and true, but having become keenly observant, I
detected a tightness around his neck and shoulders as he walked back toward the side-
lines. I wondered if his call at Yankee Stadium that had set up a homer for Jimmy Statler
was still haunting him. I shrugged at Junior’s words in my head—Pop’s not over it yet,
but we are. Let’s show him our stuff.
“Conference over, folks,” Avida said. “Let’s see what she’ll throw next. She’s
taking a moment to think, so Montego calls time-out and steps out of the box . . . Okay.
She’s ready, and so is he. The wind-up is quick and—”
The ball came letter high, but outside before Montego could adjust. My curveball
veered left and knee high, but over the plate where Montego’s swat at it was late and wild.
“He struck out again!” Avida shouted then called Montego over for his comment-
ary before the contest would resume.
“What the heck’s goin’ on out there, amigo?” she asked.
He shrugged. “Maybe I’m tired after the long season—the playoffs and a seven-
game World Series. Even so, I’ll admit, she’s pretty good.”
“Pretty good? She struck you out twice on six pitches. That’s her calling card. She
did that at Yankee Stadium.”
“She’d do well—in Little League—but she’d never make it in the majors—that’s
machismo’s sacred ground.”
Avida poked at his pride. “Even if she strikes you out three times?”
“That’s not gonna happen. No way, Joseˊ.”
Avida addressed the viewers: “OK, folks. Come back after our station break and
see for yourselves.”
During the break, Montego came over to us and said, “Hey, man. She’s makin’
me look bad. My agent called me and told me to stop the contest. He says it’s better if I
concede. Everybody will feel great about Bonnie, and the media will have no more
footage of me getting struck out by a little girl. I got a big barrio following and don’t
need to take any crap from those guys about being struck out by a six-grader.”
“That’s their problem, not yours,” Pop said. “It will be worse if you concede.
Do you want your fans to remember you like boxer, Roberto Duran—no mas? You’ve
got four more pitches to try to hit. Bonnie will do her best to strike you out, but you owe
it to yourself to try your best. You owe it to your fans and competitors, too. Anything
else would be a sham and bad for baseball.”
I grinned at Pop, knowing he couldn’t help coaching, even Montego, the best in
the game.
“Okay.” Montego shrugged. “No kidding around. I intend to get a solid hit off her
this time.”
“I thought so before I’d seen you bat,” I said. “But you have a hitch in your swing
when you stride forward. With that off-balance swing, you’ll never get a hit off me, Mr.
Montego.”
“Bonnie! Don’t be rude,” Pop scolded. “Humility. Always humility.”
Montego laughed going to the batter’s box and called to me, “We’ll see, bebe!”
Pop followed me to the mound. Trusting my keen observations, he said, “I didn’t
detect any hitch in his swing?”
“Me neither. He’s really great,” I confessed. “But now he’ll be thinking about
that hitch instead of focusing on the ball. He’s the best, so I figured I could use an edge,
especially if you want me to save my best pitch for last.”
Pop stared at me with disbelief, but loving this incredible baseball monster he
believed he’d created. Or had he? Maybe my keen senses had been there from the start
just waiting to come to life. Sometimes Junior tells me, Pop’s standing in your way.
I resumed my stance on the mound. Montego acted casual at the plate as if the
end result wouldn’t count for much. But Pop had taught me—always play to win--
give it your best—never give up until the final out. He often quoted Yogi Berra: “It
ain’t over till it’s over.”
Pop watched me closely, as if in slow motion, taking every millisecond to revel
in his daughter’s remarkable gracefulness, style, and rare talent. He had to wonder if,
beyond my desire to be the best, did I have an inkling of how great I could become?
In some ways, I’m sure he hoped I didn’t know, just so I’d remain humble. Yet, it was
my talent—only mine—so he knew I’d need some sense of pride. Without pride for my
gift, I’d be vulnerable to a harsh world that could wring my life dry and toss me onto
the heap with every other major league wannabe, man or woman.
I went into my next wind-up and threw a 79 mph slider that came right at
Montego, making him fall down backwards before it nicked the inside corner knee-high.
Avida reported: “Another strike for Bonnie. I’d need a pro to tell me what that
pitch was.”
Someone among the spectators shouted from the crowd, “It was the best yakker
I’ve ever seen!”
“Whatever you want to call it,” Avida said. “Strike one!”
Montego grumbled at the ump and kicked dust until the lefty’s batter’s box was
no longer visible. He hoped to have the advantage of stepping out of the box to lunge at
anything outside, strike or not, just to get a piece of it.
“OK, folks,” Avida continued. “She winds-up and throws.” The eye-level fastball
came right to Montego’s blind spot at 78 mph. Montego took a wicked cut. “Swung on
and—missed again! It’s show time. Bonnie’s looking at Jack, and he’s throwing her
many signs, but her expression remains calm. Jack and Bonnie seem to agree. Here
comes her wind-up, and—wow! He foul tipped an outside pitch with an awkward lunge.”
Avida interrupted the contest and came into the batting cage with the umpire and
catcher then waved for me and Pop to come to home plate. I was afraid they were going
to stop the contest, but we were joined by Baseball Commissioner Helms, who was
greeted with applause.
“Commissioner Helms, we’ve invited you here on the off-season to examine the
final baseball thrown in this competition,” Avida explained. “There have been some
rumors that when Bonnie pitched at Yankee Stadium, she’d used a trick ball, somehow
altered. What have you got in your pocket, Commish?”
Helms took a baseball from his suit pocket and flipped it in his hands a few times.
“It’s a pleasure to be here, Avida, to promote our National Pastime with its long and great
history of integrity. So to quiet any doubters, I’ve brought a certified major league base-
ball directly from the factory to assure everyone that the ball thrown on Bonnie’s last
pitch has not been altered. Here it is, and may the best man win—or best girl in Bonnie’s
case.”
After a great round of applause and a commercial break, Avida came back on the
air for the final minute of her show.
“During the break, Coach Jack Swift and his daughter, Bonnie, have had no con-
versation about her final pitch. Afterwards, whatever the result, please text into our poll:
Should Major League Baseball welcome women to play against men? Yes or No.
“Here goes Bonnie’s wind-up and . . .”
“Oh, somewhere in this favored land the sun is shining bright;
The band is playing somewhere, and somewhere hearts are light,
And somewhere men are laughing, and little children shout . . .” ***
There was great joy in Surf Ville—mighty Cesar had struck out.
*** Ernest Thayer - “Casey at the Bat” © 1888
Power of Child
By Alexandra H. Rodrigues
Irene was pleasantly surprised when Angela asked her, “Can I talk to you for a minute?”
It had been a long time since Angela had addressed her directly. She watched the slender girl plunge into the black leather chair. That chair had been Ralph’s favorite place. It never failed to amaze Irene how many of Ralph’s features were evident in the young girl’s movements. Ralph had always given a little sigh when he had dropped into that chair and so had Angela just now. Angela had Ralph’s aristocratic, well-molded facial features with the high brows and prominent cheekbones. Having Angela around, now that Ralph had passed on, was a double-edged sword: painful and yet soothing at the same time.
Irene was 32 when she had married Ralph. He was a widower whose wife had died giving birth to Angela. Ralph was Irene’s boss in the Chemical Corporation where she had been working as secretary. It had not been earthshaking love that had brought them together but a mutual understanding, a deep liking and earnest consideration of both their futures. Up to the time when Ralph had asked her to marry him, Irene had given marriage many a wishful thought but resolutely rejected to pursue any courtship. A medical examination, when she was 23, had concluded that she would never bear children. A marriage without children held no promise for her; she had made up her mind to concentrate on her career instead. Ralph and his 14-year-old daughter Angela had entered her life. He offered her marriage and with it, family. She had accepted.
Irene picked a licorice candy out of the Venetian dish and also offered some to Angela. The girl shook her head and pushed some of the blond streaks of her hair behind her ears. Irene’s thoughts went back to the day when she had met Angela for the first time. It was apparent that the young girl had been briefed about her extensively. When Irene had stretched out her arms to the pretty girl with the big blue eyes, all her desire to give love and experience the closeness of a family, had been in that gesture. Angela, on the contrary, had politely allowed to be hugged but made no attempt to return any affection. I will work on it and make her love me in time, Irene had thought, and it seemed that she would be correct. Three wonderful years and Angela did warm up to her. She had accepted her, not as a mother, but at least as a companion. They often went shopping together, played tennis, went on picnics and resembled a family. Irene had been careful not to overpower the sensitive teenager with too much emotion. In the evening they would both compete to make Ralph comfortable. There was no tension; Ralph had a wonderful talent to make them both feel important.
Then, on that lovely spring day last May, a day that ironically breathed sunshine and promise, the tragedy had hit. The office had called – Ralph had had a heart attack! When, after a maddening rush through the buzzing city streets, Irene had reached the hospital, he had already died without ever speaking to her again and before she could even have called Angela to his bedside.
She recalled how she had braced herself for the moment when she would have to tell Angela. They both had lost their closest friend, their dearest comrade. Irene was not sure what had hurt most, Ralph’s death or Angela’s bitter reaction toward her.
When she had gotten out of the taxi that had brought her back from the hospital, Angela was just coming back from school. The girl had been all bubbling with joy about a good grade in math. Irene remembered her saying, “Oh, daddy will make eyes. He will never believe I could get such a good grade in math.” At that Irene had not been able to control herself but began to sob.
“What’s wrong?” Angela wanted to know. Irene hadn’t answered till they had reached the living room. The place was so sunny and comfortable but so meaningless without Ralph. She had wanted to prepare Angela for the cruel news but had blurted out, “Angela, your father is dead. Ralph is dead.” The amiable look on Angela’s face had changed first into disbelief and then – pure horror. Angela had clenched her fists, “You did that to him, you killed him. You spoiled our life!” Forcefully she had pulled herself out of the hug with which Irene had meant to console her. Irene was not sure but she nearly thought she had sensed Angela spitting at her.
Terrible weeks had followed: the funeral, appointments with lawyers, condolences. It was a devastating rush in a dreadfully silent house. The two women, who lived side by side, hardly spoke to each other. The Angela that had emerged out of the tragedy was a person alien to Irene. Despite her own grief, Irene had tried to help Angela, willing to forgive the outbreak on the day of Ralph’s death. In vain! Angela very clearly gave her to understand, “I do not care for you at all. I hate you.”
Now Irene took another candy. She did not have to worry about her figure. She was haggard, slowly breaking under the burden of emotional stress. Angela on the contrary had regained her healthy color. She was now a young lady, quite classy and often out on dates. Two years had passed since that dreadful day, and the conduct between them had remained painfully unpleasant. Irene felt many times that she had arrived at a crossroad. Maybe she should leave. Angela was old enough to live by herself now. Irene knew that a change of scenery would do them both good. Yet she had lately discarded that idea as cowardice. Her place was still with Angela; she owed Ralph that much.
“Are you listening to me?” Angela interrupted Irene’s reminiscing. When Irene did not answer immediately, Angela announced, with a trace of malice in her voice, “I am pregnant. Dr. Blink confirmed it today.” From the way Angela lifted her head in a proud gesture, it was apparent that she was not in the least worried what Irene might think or have to say.
Irene sat up straight and closed her eyes. Had she failed? Had she allowed Angela too much freedom? She wanted to ask: “Who is the father? How? Where?” But, borne out of her forever illusory wish to have a child of her own, the words “Oh that is wonderful!” escaped her mouth.
Of all the answers Angela had expected to hear, this was not one of them. Ronny Crim, the father of the child was, just like her, 19 years old. She had been his prom date. She liked him. Did she love him? She did not really know. More than anything else it seemed such a wonderful way to be able to hurt Irene. She had been so sure that Irene would have suggested an abortion and such a great opportunity to answer to such a suggestion, “You see, you are a killer! You killed my father and now you want me to kill my child.”
Irene noticed that her response had taken Angela by surprise. She continued, “To become a mother is the most blessed thing that can happen to a woman. You see, I never told you but I can’t have children.” Once again her love for Angela welled to the surface, exposing itself to hurt. “You see, Angela, this is why it is so important to me that you should not hate me. But love cannot be forced, I know that now. Still, I will always love you.”
Suddenly, was it because she was bearing a child or merely because for the very first time since meeting Irene she was able to understand the other woman? Whatever it was, Angela felt guilty. She stood up and very slowly, very deliberately, she bent down and kissed Irene on the cheek.
The Narf
A Short Story by Charles E.J. Moulton
I took one or two steps back toward the curve and tried to catch a glimpse of what lay beyond it. There were no growls. No galloping paws. No stamping of feet. Just silence. As I tiptoed carefully in the direction of my supposed killer, hoping for relief, I expected the worst. Calumny, demise, terror, whatever. Hopeless death.
I felt like a meerkat expecting a tiger to come galloping across the savanna and devour it alive, merely biting off bits of it and letting it die slowly inside its tummy.
I think I jumped five feet into the open air when I heard the noise. It sounded like a fist being slammed against a wall. That pounding noise travelled the whole length of the steel surface, sounding like a magnetic train travelling on post-warp speeds. The bang returned, again and again, came from the gateway to the room with the cage in the unseen area.
Terrified that my time now had come to an end, I backed up a few steps, tumbled and lost my balance. Before I knew it, I skidded down one of the tunnel's long slopes, the slippery silver floor causing me to flounder. The slide down the hill seemed long and winding, although I knew that the tunnel toward the ocean went in a straight line into the dark oblivion of nightly water. I caught myself thinking that I might die of a fall against a wall and not in the hands of a strange animal.
Bumping into one of the sharper spiked edges of the wall as a result, my head banged into the pointy triangular corner and caused me to wail. Instinctively, I raised my hand and rubbed the wounded spot of the back of my head, snapping my eyes shut in pain.
For one moment I listened to the silence, heard nothing but the rotor blades and the constant hum of the motors. I literally froze to death in here, watching the visible cold air eject out of my mouth. If I spent another few minutes in here, I knew I might not be able to move anymore. What scared me even more, I still had a bit left to run. What would I do when I reached the ocean, though? Swim back to Japan? No, I would die in that water.
Supporting myself up with my one still intact arm, I managed to hold on to the wall. The upper, smoother surface of one of the spikes helped me up. When I looked back into the light, I heard the snarl again. The creature had not yet arrived in my part of the tunnel. That seemed good, didn't it? At least for the time being. Who knows how long I could on like this, though? Now my head and my arm hurt. One more hurt limb and the beast would definitely be having me for supper and probably digesting me slowly at that.
Now, I heard steps. Okay, this was it. Holy shit. Fast steps accelerating into a quick run. The echoes of the beast galloping down after me sent shivers down my spine, especially since it had been my wife that had sent the beast after me this time and not my brother like last time. I shot up and started running, screaming at the beast while I ran.
"If you wanna kill me, you better work a little harder," I yelled into the obscure light, then looking back at the long stretch that lay ahead of me. Jesus, I thought to myself. How am I ever going to make this alive. "Darling?" I yelled. "Did you feed the animal yet? I think he's getting hungry."
Run, run, run. Pant, pant, pant. Yell, scream, sigh. Nervous, terrified, neurotic.
That was me in frigging nutshell.
Silly. How silly of me. My wife was in a completely different part of the ship, probably making love to my bastard brother. She didn’t care.
I laughed once as I ran. It was a short quick laugh, desperate, frantic, almost, a bit angry, even. The blister that slowly formed itself on my head started throbbing. My hand formed a fist, shaking at the sky and then, with it, I banged at my head. Again and again, I banged at my head with one fist and then screaming, pulling at my hair, realizing there was no way out of this but dying or killing the beast with my one surviving arm.
I don't know, but I think think that gesture of frustration aimed to inflict myself with more scars. Either I would grow stronger through it, kill myself or send a sign to whatever culprit was out there that I was willing to hurt myself first. Maybe then the creature would stop hurting me. That was a dream, though. A silly dream. Hurting myself wouldn't really help, would it? It would just kill me quicker. That way, my brother and my wife would be able to have sex in peace and the beast could have a quick snack of human flesh.
I stopped, for a heard steps and yet I didn’t see the animal. Was it merely walking on one spot just to scare me or running down the stretch from its cage? There it was again, the snarl. Deep, throaty, harsh. I backed a few steps down the second slope. I didn’t want to fall down again.
Okay. Now I saw the beast, appearing beyond the curve from where the light came. Jesus, it was big. Had it grown since last time? Holy shit, it would crush me with one swift stroke. I wouldn’t have to worry about dying in his tummy. One punch and I would be gone forever. My wife, the Princess Wih-Me’h-Weh, had found a way to make things even scarier. The beast did not only have its large heelspikes on. It also wore that infamous helmet with the electric shock prods. Hadn't she warned me about that?
I started running again, first backwards and then turning around to face the end of the long tunnel I was in. Now, another five minutes awaited me before I reached the sea at the end of that stretch. God only knew what I would do then.
“Can’t run backward,” I mumbled to myself as I scooted off to my certain doom. “Run or die.”
Actually, I sort of cursed my fate that I had been chosen to come on this huge ship exclusively cruising the Pacific. So I ran like crazy, all the time hearing this hairy beast coming closer and closer. The snarl also seemed to reverberate louder the closer it came to me. Last time, I had survived this. I had lured the beast into jumping into the sea, heelspikes and all. The following kangaroo trial, complete with my brother as a judge and my wife as the prosecutor, had been ridiculous. No defending judge? Me silenced, a ball in my mouth and a scarf around my head? Come on. I really regretted falling in love with this damn alien princess, especially since she took on my brother as a lover. That might be normal on her planet, but it sure as hell was unusual over here.
Damn it, I thought to myself, I should have listened to my father. He told me that the woman would come to haunt me. My brother? Well, obviously he didn't care. He had always been the rebel, the recluse. He had always hated the rest of us. Now I paid for the fact that I had asked my dad to disown him.
"Let the beast try to chase him into the ocean again," she had shouted to the jury. "If he survives, I will divorce him. In any case, I will be rid of him."
I repeated her words in my head over and over as I ran toward what I thought was my certain death. I got angrier and angrier while escaping the beast, at first at myself for falling in lust with this four breasted vixen and then at her for pulling me away to court because ... what had it been? I hadn't performed to her liking? How could I have with her sitting on me and grinding all the time? Not even in my wildest dreams had I imagined myself hating having married an alien.
I saw the end of the tunnel now and the ocean that lay beyond it. This is when true panic hit me. I could feel the stinky breath of the beast on my back, his furry paws tickling my neck. It was drowning in the Pacific, salty water filling up my lungs, or providing an ogre piece of my head. What would you do? How would you want to die? In the belly of a beast or at the bottom of the ocean?
“God,” I yelled, my head and one injured arm hurting, “help me.”
Closer and closer it came, I could feel it approaching me, breathing on me, it even sounded like it cackled at me behind my back, waiting to seize me and crush my skull. Oh, God, I didn’t want to die just yet. The ocean was just a few paces away. Man, could I climb up to deck to one of the lifeboats? With what? Shit, now I felt the beast breathing on me.
“Go away,” I screamed. “Go away ...”
When the beast reached me, its paws grabbed me and turned me around, shook me and hit me, causing me to run a few paces in mid air, so to speak. I gasped at the idea of now becoming the evening meal of a brute. I tried to escape the hard grip by hitting him on his furry arms. All that did was give him a jolly little chuckle.
Now I hung there in his arms, drooling, my heart beating fast and my lungs on overdrive, my shoulders hurting like crazy, looking into the multicolored three eyes of this Narf, one of the hideous beasts in Princess Wih-Me’h-Weh’s possession. Too late had I found out that it was her favorite killer. A killer with a foul breath worse than rotted herring. A killer so huge that my pointed feet only reached its hips when it held me a few feet above ground.
Growl, spit, drool, cackle, crunch.
"Now what?" I spat at the beast, weeping. "Aren't you going to do something? Eat me or at least sprinkle me with some salt? I might taste good with ketchup, you creep. God damn it, stupid. Do something."
I have no idea why I became cynical at that point. I mean, my head now produced little shy drops of blood that trickled down my forehead. My arm? Well, the fact that I had sprained it turned the entire experience of being crushed to pieces into a slowly worsening nightmare.
The pain actually created the cataclysmic sadness in my heart. I would never see my father again, who probably hated me anyway for marrying one of the alien invaders. What can I say? I wanted to survive. The only reason why my dad still was alive was that he was a politician. My mom had been a housewife. She had been executed right before my fake kangaroo trial. The reason? Infiltrating common people with anti-galactic ideas.
Talking with her lady friends over coffee, was that anti-galactic?
Man, I thought to myself, how had managed to lure the beast into the ocean last time? By jumping to the side and causing it to stumble. That wouldn't work now, would it?
So I cried bitter hot tears that burned my skin as they fell down my cheeks, my nose producing gallons of snot to release the pain of an ending life. But as I closed my eyes again, waiting for the beast to open one of its black mouths and begin chewing on my shoulder, I suddenly heard a whimper too feeble to come out of the mouth of a monster from way off the planet of Whiulhaga. It was the beast, though.
As I opened my eyes again, I saw it froth at the mouth, roll its eyes, open its mouths wider than anything I'd seen before, shaking its headfur in a way that reminded me of that ancient English pop group that had been active back in the 20th century. What were they called? Oh, yeah. The Beatles. I almost expected John, Paul, George and Ringo to pop out of the Narf’s mouth, singing: “She loves you, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeaaaaaaaaah!”
Instead, the Narf’s damn helmet with the electric prods short circuited, sending sparks not out into the tunnel, but into the Narf’s brain.
We were relatively close to the booming and splashing Pacific, so the waves must’ve done their part in creating a veritable electrocution of the beast.
In one swift swoosh, the Narf dropped me, having me land on my right knee. The pain skyrocketed into my brain and caused me to growl a bass note that would have a male opera singer spit glue and utter jealous venom. The arm, the head, the knee, they all caused me to scream in utter suffering. I didn’t scream for long, though. The helmet on the Narf’s head exploded, sending his stinky ooze right out into the Pacific and literally sprinkling me with the scent of a thousand unwashed nights in rusty cages.
Gha-Blooof!
The creature went down like a redwood tree, sending echoes up and down this organized tunnel of torture within the royal cruise ship.
The beast lay there, immobile, seemingly dead. Me? I winced, wrinkled my nose, carefully wiping the slime off my face and trying to survive a stink that might have been normal on the planet of Whiulhaga, but reminded my human nose of flatulent zombies.
Carefully, I got up on my throbbing knees and shouted myself into a bent position. Slowly, I limped over to the panting and puffing giant, oozing spit. Three long, furry, ten feet ex- and inhaled breaths later, the Narf blubbered and belched its last grunt and disappeared into Narf Heaven or Narf Hell, whatever the case might have been.
For a long while, I really don’t know how long, I stood bending over the Narf, the Pacific Ocean nearly washing me into its depth. I hurt like a thousand nightmares, but it didn’t matter. Somehow, I didn’t care. The slow blubber that grumbled in my tummy felt like an oncoming burp at first, but I hadn’t eaten for two days, so that would be impossible. Then I realized that it was happiness. The blubber shot up my windpipes and landed in my mouth, exhaled a frantic laugh.
Despite my extreme pain, I began limping in very excited leap.
“Princess Wih-Me’h-Weh,” I screamed, my laughter sounding like the scream of a insane schizophrenic. “Wifey-Pifey, I killed your Narfy-Wharphy. Kiss my ...”
Excited by this development that I might survive after all, I kicked the remains of the monster and began humping and sliding back the way I came. All the way, I sang “For he’s a jolly good fellow, which nobody can deny” full throttle and with such atonality that it probably would have killed the Narf without any electricution.
“Killed by bad singing,” I laughed all the way to the curve, kicking the place on the wall where I had hurt my head.
I was on a fool’s errand.
Once I passed the curve and reached the room with the cage, the room where I had spent the last two days gazing at the Narf, my eyes met an army. The hall with the cage was filled to the brim with soldiers. No, they were not soldiers. Pirates, criminals, recruits from the lower bowels of Hades. I have no idea how they silently had snook into the dungeon of this luxurious ship, but here they were. Tall handsome four armed Zooks from the ghetto continent Hundsaih, four nosed brutes from Theouali and three headed Osajags from the swimming fields of northern Whiulhaga. They all grunted in unison, stamping their feet, waving their arms in a strange choreographed way. With every stomp, I took another step back, my flesh trembling, my legs shaking by the force of the aggressive thumping of this surprising army.
Why does one run upon facing a threat?
It was wrong to run, but I did it anyway. I ran, but I didn’t run back toward the Pacific Ocean. I ran into the crowd, fighting myself through soldiers, beating me senseless, kicking me, screaming at me all the way back to the staircase that I knew would take me to my current wife, the royal Princess Wih-Me’h-Weh of the planet Whiulhaga.
I reached the door, but had only grabbed the handle when three of the four armed Zooks took me by my bruised and injured arms. They kicked down the door and ran up the staircase with me, finally throwing me into a room completely covered in gold and silver, our former bedroom where we had spent our honeymoon exactly one year ago.
“Happy anniversary,” I mumbled, the pain in my head grinding and thumping between my earlobes. And pounding and banging on the insides of my brain. I added a foul yell, hearing the high heels of my spouse click against the ivory floor: “Too much pain actually turns the tables on the suffering. I am now immune to your torture.”
Her clicking heels halted, those black and gold colored shoes giving me the kick I knew would catapult me to success. Again and again, I had looked up those latex pants and felt what I felt right now. I knew that the game we played could be repeated endlessly.
Slowly and surely, I stood up, supporting myself on my one intact arm.
Inch by inch, I followed her frame up to her steel shoulderpads, the flowers in her purple hair, her four seductive eyes and knowing halfsmile.
“You have done well,” she told me. “Surprisingly.”
I shrugged, looking at her with disgust. “What now?”
“Computer,” she commanded. “End program!”
The entire backdrop of this virtual world we had created for each other disintergrated, sounding like a landing rocket. The golden and silvery hall vanished, the Pacific Ocean turned into proverbial dust and we ended up looking at each other for a while as we were. Just two people in ordinary clothes playing hide and seek. No alien princess, no doomed warrior. Just two people that liked playing with each other.
“You shutting this down?” I cackled, trying to sound cheerful.
“You won,” she shrugged. “I told you that if you vanquished the Narf I would let you go. You have it your way. Good bye!”
I shook my head. “Nalia, you know I don’t want to end this!”
Nalia took a short stroll over to her locker and opened it, taking out her sport bag and slowly unclothing, putting socks and panties in the bag, taking out her jeans.
“So?”
I trembled, more intensely than I had when the Narf attacked me. I was losing my partner.
“So, I want to keep playing this game with you,” I answered.
She looked down at the bra she held in her hand and pursed her lips.
“Martin, you know I love you,” she said. “But ...”
The long pause almost drove me crazy.
“Continue,” I demanded.
She shrugged. “Whatever.”
Nalia put on her bra, her T-shirt, her pants, and finally stood there holding on to her baseball cap.
“Nalia, God damn it, talk to me,” I screamed.
“All the time,” she said, pointing at me, “you demand that I go in here into this virtual world, playing the evil alien princess. I’m sick of it.”
“I created this virtual world for us, because we love adventure stories,” I responded.
“Yes,” she answered me “but you never take me out on any real adventures any more.”
“What are you saying?”
Nalia threw down her bag on the bench next to the locker. The sound reverberated several times between the steel walls that had transformed into an alien ship on the Pacific Ocean a moment ago.
“Martin,” she said, “I fell in love with you because you took me out on trips with your rocket and told me things. You knew stuff about planets I never knew existed.”
She giggled, panting and moaning at the same time.
“We went to that music club in Alpha Centauri, remember?”
“The Waylo?”
“Yes!” Nalia said, happily chanting. “Exactly, if you shut down this program, lay it on ice for a bit, and take me back to the Waylo for a month, I will stay with you. I’m damn tired of being this dumb Princess Wih-Me’h-Weh and I bet you’re getting sick of being this ... warrior dude. Let’s go dancing, okay? Take me out on a real adventure, okay?”
I nodded. “Okay.”
Nalia cheered. I had actually never seen her cheer so enthusiastically.
Her embrace grew more and more tender, sweeter and more fragile the longer it lasted. It made me happy, sure. Very happy. There was just one huge problem.
“Nalia, love,” I began, my hands shaking. “I don’t know how to tell you this, but ...”
Nalia bent over toward me, kissing me on the mouth. I returned her kiss, of course, smelled her perfume, touched her hair, all of that. I almost chose not to say what I was about to say. But I knew I had to say it. She had to know.
“Yes?”
God, I feared losing her. I know that I had gotten her back by telling her to shut down our program, but would I lose her if I told her the truth?
“The Narf exists,” I said, finally.
She took a step back. “What?”
She winced, giving me a cynical chuckle.
“You’re kidding me, right?”
I shook my head. “No, I met one on an away mission in the western Milky Way. I was about twenty, a young cadet. It was before I knew you. The Narf almost killed me. That’s where I got the scar on my buttock.”
Nalia started laughing. “An alien monster bit your butt?”
I laughed, quite sadly, actually, because the worst was yet to come.
“Yes, Nalia, but there’s more.”
“Come on, Martin,” she jibed, slapping my arm. “So you created the Narf out of a real creature on some cockameme planet you visited ten years ago. What of it? Let’s go. This place costs us more money every minute.”
She took her bag, walked toward the holographic machine, almost sticking out her hand to eject the Virtual Stick from the Holo-World machine.
“Take me to Alpha Centauri,” she sing-songed. “Let’s eat Olhagsian Zsfas with donuts and make love under the suns of Da-Yxaa.”
“The Narf is back,” I spat.
Nalia turned around again, her long blonde hair swaying in the breeze of her own turn.
“Excuse me?”
I sighed, expecting the worst.
“Ten years ago, we were over there in the Narf-Planet, as we tended to call it, to stop a mission that these guys had to conquer humanity.”
“Hold on,” she said, throwing down her bag again. “These guys can talk and think?”
I nodded. “I just made them more stupid than they really are in my program. In fact, they are intellectuals, academics and strong, admant clerics. That makes them dangerous. They are smart monsters.”
Nalia looked down, trying to decide if I was nuts, stupid, silly or just a damned liar.
“Naahhh,” she said. “Don’t believe a word of it.”
She walked over to the black Holo-World machine again and almost pressed the button to take out the Virtual Stick of my fake world, where she was an alien princess and I was a warrior. It was then that I told her the truth.
“I’ve been chosen to lead an army that will go back to the planet to kill these bastards. They want to kill us,” I said. “I spent the last months training for what is waiting for me over there. That is why I have been so obsessed about this. I have been training for a mission.”
Nalia raised her eyebrows. “When were you going to tell me this?”
“Admiral Isaacs told me it was top secret, up until yesterday. I wasn’t allowed to tell you before. I got into a huge fight with him a few months ago, because I said you and I were getting married and I didn’t want to keep these kinds of things from you. He said that I had to train for this mission, come what may, and I figured that the only way that I could spend time with you was take you along for this ride. Pluck out my old Narf-program with the love affair thingie. We could be together and I could still train for my mission.”
Nalia slooped down to the floor, dropping her bag, landing on her tush and put her head in her hands. “I hate your job,” she wept. “Man, I hate it.”
I came up to her, sat down and put my hand on her lap. “I hate it, too.”
I had to break this to her gently.
“But I have to do this. We have to beat the Narfs.”
Nalia sighed, taking my hand. “Just when I thought we were doing so well and the government wasn’t going to send you on one of those wild secret missions.”
I caressed Nalia’s face, leaning over to kiss her. She looked away.
“How am I going to survive without you, Martin?”
I shook my head. “You won’t have to.”
She looked up. “Huh?”
I tilted my head. “Admiral Isaacs gave me the approval of taking you along.”
“Me?” she giggled. “What am I supposed to do? Bake muffins for the army?”
“Don’t be so modest, babe,” I chuckled. “You’re a trained martial artist and a computer specialist. You also have an incredible asset.”
“I’m a good kisser?”
I laughed. “That, too. No, I’m talking about your electric education. Electricity, Nalia.”
“They’re into heavy metal?”
I laughed again. “No, they all wear electric helmets. We’re planning on electrocuting them. That’s why I designed that scene in our story.”
Nalia’s jaw dropped. “You mean ...”
I nodded. “If we beat these guys, I will not only take you to The Waylo to dance and eat Olhagsian Zsfas with donuts and make love under the suns of Da-Yxaa. We will also get married inside The Waylo under the suns of Da-Yxaa.”
“Holy shit, Martin,” she said. “When are we leaving?” Nalia stood up, running to the locker and changing into her holographic sportwear again. She turned around again. “When are we fucking leaving?”
“Next month, why?” I answered, still sitting on the floor.
“Get up,” she said. “We still have time for another round of kicking the Narf’s ass.”
I laughed and jumped for joy, running up to kiss my bride to be.
I knew we were going to make it, because no one could kick ass as well as my girl Nalia. We did kick ass in my Holo-Story and we did electrocute the Narfs, and – Hot Damn! – we were good at it.
The wedding at The Waylo a year later turned into a gigantic success.
And as we made love under the suns of Da-Yxaa on the first night of our honeymoon, we sang to the moons and kissed the stars. The hotel we were in was a boat, you see, and our floating dreamship was made of the finest and most shiny, glowing, alien material. Before we laughed ourselves to sleep, we kissed, made up and swore to love each other forever more.
A few hours later, however, something woke us up.
In the distance, we heard what almost sounded like a fist being slammed against a wall. That pounding noise travelled the whole length of a steel surface, sounding like a magnetic train travelling on post-warp speeds.
The Narf was back.
The Guardian
By Damien Dantes
The Guardian moved.
Slowly the point of his black sword crept upwards, pointed skywards, and tilted back, to finally rest in its scabbard on the black armoured back. The heavy, full visored helmet looked up, and his weary stance shifted. A first, halting step nearly brought him to his knees, but he recovered, and took a second step. With each step his strength and sure-footedness seemed to return, and his strides grew longer and stronger, until they radiated a sense of inevitability. Without one look back, he strode off the grassy knoll, away from the Plains of Sorrow.
The Guardian moved.
For centuries, and some said eons, the Guardian had stood on that hillock in the precise centre of the Plains. Sword in hand, the tip resting on the ground, as if the sword had grown too heavy. His posture, legs spread and slightly buckled, bent forwards, on the verge of keeling over. For as long as the peoples of the plains could remember, and their singers remembered songs from before the peoples came to the plains, the Guardian had stood his ground and never moved.
Ancient tales, gleaned from tribes that were no longer, regaled the stories of the Guardian and his Companions. They were the Guardian, the Archer, the Red Man, the Gray Man, the Fool and the Foreigner. The band of six one day rode onto the Plains at the fore of a vast army, to do battle upon the Hordes of Evil, that were ravaging the world. How the six Companions had found each other is not told in the tales of old, but as they appeared on the ancient battlefield, the multitude cheered. The Guardian stood over seven feet tall, and his companions were all no less than tall than him, save for the fool, who was five foot four, lithe and nimble. And it was said that wherever the Companions went, all stood aside and cheered and paid homage. Yet these men were no kings.
The Guardian rode a tall dark horse, covered in plate armour, just as its rider, and the armour was burnished until it shone like silver. His tall helmet bore of the whitest swans, his surcoat was of the finest and bluest silk, and his cape as white as the snow on virgin mountaintops.
The Archer rode a brown, steady horse. His light armour was chosen in forest colours, and when he stood still, he blended into the forest like none. He toted a longbow of the finest hazel, with bowstrings that sang like the strings of a harp when released, and two quivers with steel tipped, yard long arrows.
The Red Man was clad all in red, as was his horse, and his weapons of choice were dual scimitars, which he wielded with deadly precision. His red robes hinted of deserts, red and hot and dry places, but his skin was fair as a Northerners.
The Gray Man wore simple clothes of unobtrusive colours, and his features were the commonest of common. It was said that a spell was cast on him that made others forget him as soon as he left their company.
The Fool was small and nimble. In fact, everything about him was small, except for his nose. He was clad in bright colours and resembled nothing as much as a jester. But the wide sleeves of his brocade vest held deadly knives that flashed through the air with the speed of lightning.
The Foreigner rode a small white horse, a horse so small that when he let his legs dangle from the stirrups, he could put his feet on the ground and let the horse walk away from under him. Yet from upon this horse he wielded a mighty war hammer. He was fully clad in chain mail, but wore a green surcoat with a blank coat of arms over it. Ancient tales say that in battle the horse grew under him to be a mighty steed, and none could stand before the two.
And so these Six Companions rode out on the dawn of the Longest Battle, at the head of an army so vast, that it took weeks for the last ones to reach the Plains.
And so it came to pass that this vast legion was met upon the plains by the Hordes of Evil, fierce creatures from beyond the world, hell bent on destruction and mayhem. And there were Orcs, and Goblins, and Dark Elves, and Ogres, and Vampires, and Trolls, and Swamp Things, Ghouls, and Ghosts, Unseen Things, and Unnamed Things, and Sorcerers, and Warlocks, Harpies, and Sirens. All had gathered to meet the Army of the World.
And the two forces did great battle upon each other. The ancients tell of numerous heroic deeds by many of the combatants of the army of good, but of none were deeds so great as of the Six Companions. Wherever the resolve lagged, lines were pushed back, regiments threatened to crumble, the Guardian and his band were seen reviving the men and shoring up the resolve. The battle lasted for days.
Alas, the Hordes of Evil outnumbered the Army of the World. For it is much easier to spawn evil and let it fester on its own, than give birth to good and nurture it to wisdom. And although the numbers of this army were vast, the hordes were almost innumerable. For every slain Orc, two took his place. For every Ogre put down, two arose.
And it came to pass that at a small grassy hillock at the precise centre of the Plains, the pitiful remains of that great army made their final stand. And they were led by the Guardian and his companions. Though formidable heroes of ancient times they were, they were also mere mortals. As the fighting grew more and more frenzied, and the men around them fell, desperation crept into the hearts of each of them. Finally, at noon of the seventh day, they stood alone against an enemy that seemed undepleted.
As the Hordes charged for yet another assault, despair gripped the soul of the Foreigner. He lowered his war hammer, tears streaming from his face, and let himself be slaughtered. It was at that moment that the blackest of deeds occurred on these plains, for as the five survivors made to close ranks, the Fool laid off his mask, and was revealed the Traitor. Standing nearest to the Gray Man, for he had always professed his friendship for his companion, he stabbed his friend in the back, straight through the Heart. It is said that it was at that time that the armour of the Guardian turned the blackest of black, and the feathers upon his helmet turned to horns. Such was his wrath that the revenge he took upon the body of the Traitor so gruesome that even the Gods turned their heads away, and the Hordes of Evil who had jeered at the betrayal retreated. (Run-on-sentence. Break it up. I.e.: So great was his wrath and so gruesome was his revenge that even the Gods turned their heads away. The Hordes of Evil, who had jeered at the betrayal, retreated.)
Some say, that the Guardian sent his two remaining companions away at that time. Others say, they left him for fear he had gone insane. Again others say, he sent them away, but they returned in his hour of need. But all repeat the words he spoke to them:
“My friends, we have fought our battle, but we have fought and lost. It is time for me to gather all that is good and kind in this world, all that is just and righteous, all that is beautiful in sight and sound, all that cares and loves, and guard it for times to come, until I may release all of it back into a gentler world. Go from here, for the fight that now comes upon us (cut the comma) is a fight to the end. (New sentence) I would have you away from that fight, to continue spreading goodness in the lands for as long as you can.” (Sounds poetic, but I am not sure it is perfectly correct English. Alternatively, try: I would protect you from joining that battle, so that you can fulfil your destiny in spreading goodness through the land indefinitely.)
But whether or not the Archer and the Red Man went their ways or not, when the charge of the Hordes of Evil came, they stood at the ready at the Guardian’s side. And it was as if the blackening of his armour had given the Guardian new strength. He slew fiends by the scores, even though they kept coming at him. And as the sun set in a black and blood red sky, he found himself alone on the grassy knoll. Sometime, during battle, both the Archer and the Red Man had been slain. There was no trace of either, but to his left lay the bent scimitars of the Red Man, and to his right the broken longbow and empty quivers of the Archer.
Overcome by sorrow, the Guardian sank on one knee, his sword point down into the earth. Great waves of despair, loneliness and grief washed over him, and his mighty shoulders shook. His tears, streaming from under his great helmet, drew fiery red lines on the breast plate of his harness. Blood red tears welled out of the eye sockets of the helmet and made a terrible pattern on the helmet’s cheeks. So great was his sorrow, that even the Hordes, for a moment, kept a respectful distance from their formidable foe.
Then he rose, and in a terrible voice swore he a great oath. Never to move from his post, for as long as there was a breath in him; to guard all that was good against those who would destroy and annihilate; to deny any and all of the Hordes entrance to the Plains beyond this point; and to never rest until all were slain.
It was with a most horrible howling that the Hordes of Evil charged his position, only to find that a magical line had spread to the Guardian’s left and right sides. No Orc, no Goblin, not even the most powerful Warlock could cross that line. The only path to the Lands beyond lay over the hillock, occupied by the Guardian. The Ancient stories tell of days of slaughter, when the evil spawn had to clear away their dead, because they couldn’t reach the Guardian anymore. But the Guardian stood his ground, weary and hurt.
It became increasingly difficult for the leaders of the Hordes to find men to send against the Guardian, and it took them longer and longer. Inbetween fights, the Guardian stood watch, until the fights became fewer and fewer, and then ceased altogether.
It was not until centuries after the last of these battles that our peoples came to the Plains. For a brief time the ancient tribes and the new lived together, and our forefathers learned of the Guardian and his companions. But the story of the Guardian remained just that, a story, and a story that was not of our people.
And then the Guardian moved.
It is said by the same old stories that the Guardian not only guards all that is good, all that is beautiful, and all that is love, but that he did all he did FOR love. As he guards love, so does love guard him.
And there is a prophecy in the old songs. It is sung that there will come a time when the Guardian will walk away from his hillock, and leave his post. And on this day, the last of the minions of Evil will lay down and die, and the Guardian, freed from his oath, will restore goodness, and kindness, justice and righteousness, beauty, care and love to the world, and return to his love to die at her bosom.
But it is also sung that on the day the Guardian moves, it will be the Guardian’s decision to restore goodness to the world or not, and that the blackness in the heart of the Guardian, caused by the betrayal of the Fool and Traitor, will have him forego the restoration of the world, and in this hour the universe will die with him.
Today the Guardian moved.
By Damien Dantes
The Guardian moved.
Slowly the point of his black sword crept upwards, pointed skywards, and tilted back, to finally rest in its scabbard on the black armoured back. The heavy, full visored helmet looked up, and his weary stance shifted. A first, halting step nearly brought him to his knees, but he recovered, and took a second step. With each step his strength and sure-footedness seemed to return, and his strides grew longer and stronger, until they radiated a sense of inevitability. Without one look back, he strode off the grassy knoll, away from the Plains of Sorrow.
The Guardian moved.
For centuries, and some said eons, the Guardian had stood on that hillock in the precise centre of the Plains. Sword in hand, the tip resting on the ground, as if the sword had grown too heavy. His posture, legs spread and slightly buckled, bent forwards, on the verge of keeling over. For as long as the peoples of the plains could remember, and their singers remembered songs from before the peoples came to the plains, the Guardian had stood his ground and never moved.
Ancient tales, gleaned from tribes that were no longer, regaled the stories of the Guardian and his Companions. They were the Guardian, the Archer, the Red Man, the Gray Man, the Fool and the Foreigner. The band of six one day rode onto the Plains at the fore of a vast army, to do battle upon the Hordes of Evil, that were ravaging the world. How the six Companions had found each other is not told in the tales of old, but as they appeared on the ancient battlefield, the multitude cheered. The Guardian stood over seven feet tall, and his companions were all no less than tall than him, save for the fool, who was five foot four, lithe and nimble. And it was said that wherever the Companions went, all stood aside and cheered and paid homage. Yet these men were no kings.
The Guardian rode a tall dark horse, covered in plate armour, just as its rider, and the armour was burnished until it shone like silver. His tall helmet bore of the whitest swans, his surcoat was of the finest and bluest silk, and his cape as white as the snow on virgin mountaintops.
The Archer rode a brown, steady horse. His light armour was chosen in forest colours, and when he stood still, he blended into the forest like none. He toted a longbow of the finest hazel, with bowstrings that sang like the strings of a harp when released, and two quivers with steel tipped, yard long arrows.
The Red Man was clad all in red, as was his horse, and his weapons of choice were dual scimitars, which he wielded with deadly precision. His red robes hinted of deserts, red and hot and dry places, but his skin was fair as a Northerners.
The Gray Man wore simple clothes of unobtrusive colours, and his features were the commonest of common. It was said that a spell was cast on him that made others forget him as soon as he left their company.
The Fool was small and nimble. In fact, everything about him was small, except for his nose. He was clad in bright colours and resembled nothing as much as a jester. But the wide sleeves of his brocade vest held deadly knives that flashed through the air with the speed of lightning.
The Foreigner rode a small white horse, a horse so small that when he let his legs dangle from the stirrups, he could put his feet on the ground and let the horse walk away from under him. Yet from upon this horse he wielded a mighty war hammer. He was fully clad in chain mail, but wore a green surcoat with a blank coat of arms over it. Ancient tales say that in battle the horse grew under him to be a mighty steed, and none could stand before the two.
And so these Six Companions rode out on the dawn of the Longest Battle, at the head of an army so vast, that it took weeks for the last ones to reach the Plains.
And so it came to pass that this vast legion was met upon the plains by the Hordes of Evil, fierce creatures from beyond the world, hell bent on destruction and mayhem. And there were Orcs, and Goblins, and Dark Elves, and Ogres, and Vampires, and Trolls, and Swamp Things, Ghouls, and Ghosts, Unseen Things, and Unnamed Things, and Sorcerers, and Warlocks, Harpies, and Sirens. All had gathered to meet the Army of the World.
And the two forces did great battle upon each other. The ancients tell of numerous heroic deeds by many of the combatants of the army of good, but of none were deeds so great as of the Six Companions. Wherever the resolve lagged, lines were pushed back, regiments threatened to crumble, the Guardian and his band were seen reviving the men and shoring up the resolve. The battle lasted for days.
Alas, the Hordes of Evil outnumbered the Army of the World. For it is much easier to spawn evil and let it fester on its own, than give birth to good and nurture it to wisdom. And although the numbers of this army were vast, the hordes were almost innumerable. For every slain Orc, two took his place. For every Ogre put down, two arose.
And it came to pass that at a small grassy hillock at the precise centre of the Plains, the pitiful remains of that great army made their final stand. And they were led by the Guardian and his companions. Though formidable heroes of ancient times they were, they were also mere mortals. As the fighting grew more and more frenzied, and the men around them fell, desperation crept into the hearts of each of them. Finally, at noon of the seventh day, they stood alone against an enemy that seemed undepleted.
As the Hordes charged for yet another assault, despair gripped the soul of the Foreigner. He lowered his war hammer, tears streaming from his face, and let himself be slaughtered. It was at that moment that the blackest of deeds occurred on these plains, for as the five survivors made to close ranks, the Fool laid off his mask, and was revealed the Traitor. Standing nearest to the Gray Man, for he had always professed his friendship for his companion, he stabbed his friend in the back, straight through the Heart. It is said that it was at that time that the armour of the Guardian turned the blackest of black, and the feathers upon his helmet turned to horns. Such was his wrath that the revenge he took upon the body of the Traitor so gruesome that even the Gods turned their heads away, and the Hordes of Evil who had jeered at the betrayal retreated. (Run-on-sentence. Break it up. I.e.: So great was his wrath and so gruesome was his revenge that even the Gods turned their heads away. The Hordes of Evil, who had jeered at the betrayal, retreated.)
Some say, that the Guardian sent his two remaining companions away at that time. Others say, they left him for fear he had gone insane. Again others say, he sent them away, but they returned in his hour of need. But all repeat the words he spoke to them:
“My friends, we have fought our battle, but we have fought and lost. It is time for me to gather all that is good and kind in this world, all that is just and righteous, all that is beautiful in sight and sound, all that cares and loves, and guard it for times to come, until I may release all of it back into a gentler world. Go from here, for the fight that now comes upon us (cut the comma) is a fight to the end. (New sentence) I would have you away from that fight, to continue spreading goodness in the lands for as long as you can.” (Sounds poetic, but I am not sure it is perfectly correct English. Alternatively, try: I would protect you from joining that battle, so that you can fulfil your destiny in spreading goodness through the land indefinitely.)
But whether or not the Archer and the Red Man went their ways or not, when the charge of the Hordes of Evil came, they stood at the ready at the Guardian’s side. And it was as if the blackening of his armour had given the Guardian new strength. He slew fiends by the scores, even though they kept coming at him. And as the sun set in a black and blood red sky, he found himself alone on the grassy knoll. Sometime, during battle, both the Archer and the Red Man had been slain. There was no trace of either, but to his left lay the bent scimitars of the Red Man, and to his right the broken longbow and empty quivers of the Archer.
Overcome by sorrow, the Guardian sank on one knee, his sword point down into the earth. Great waves of despair, loneliness and grief washed over him, and his mighty shoulders shook. His tears, streaming from under his great helmet, drew fiery red lines on the breast plate of his harness. Blood red tears welled out of the eye sockets of the helmet and made a terrible pattern on the helmet’s cheeks. So great was his sorrow, that even the Hordes, for a moment, kept a respectful distance from their formidable foe.
Then he rose, and in a terrible voice swore he a great oath. Never to move from his post, for as long as there was a breath in him; to guard all that was good against those who would destroy and annihilate; to deny any and all of the Hordes entrance to the Plains beyond this point; and to never rest until all were slain.
It was with a most horrible howling that the Hordes of Evil charged his position, only to find that a magical line had spread to the Guardian’s left and right sides. No Orc, no Goblin, not even the most powerful Warlock could cross that line. The only path to the Lands beyond lay over the hillock, occupied by the Guardian. The Ancient stories tell of days of slaughter, when the evil spawn had to clear away their dead, because they couldn’t reach the Guardian anymore. But the Guardian stood his ground, weary and hurt.
It became increasingly difficult for the leaders of the Hordes to find men to send against the Guardian, and it took them longer and longer. Inbetween fights, the Guardian stood watch, until the fights became fewer and fewer, and then ceased altogether.
It was not until centuries after the last of these battles that our peoples came to the Plains. For a brief time the ancient tribes and the new lived together, and our forefathers learned of the Guardian and his companions. But the story of the Guardian remained just that, a story, and a story that was not of our people.
And then the Guardian moved.
It is said by the same old stories that the Guardian not only guards all that is good, all that is beautiful, and all that is love, but that he did all he did FOR love. As he guards love, so does love guard him.
And there is a prophecy in the old songs. It is sung that there will come a time when the Guardian will walk away from his hillock, and leave his post. And on this day, the last of the minions of Evil will lay down and die, and the Guardian, freed from his oath, will restore goodness, and kindness, justice and righteousness, beauty, care and love to the world, and return to his love to die at her bosom.
But it is also sung that on the day the Guardian moves, it will be the Guardian’s decision to restore goodness to the world or not, and that the blackness in the heart of the Guardian, caused by the betrayal of the Fool and Traitor, will have him forego the restoration of the world, and in this hour the universe will die with him.
Today the Guardian moved.
Book Excerpt
Villette
By Charlotte Bronte
CHAPTER I
BRETTON
My godmother lived in a handsome house in the clean and ancient town of Bretton. Her husband's family had been residents there for generations, and bore, indeed, the name of their birthplace—Bretton of Bretton: whether by coincidence, or because some remote ancestor had been a personage of sufficient importance to leave his name to his neighbourhood, I know not.
When I was a girl I went to Bretton about twice a year, and well I liked the visit. The house and its inmates specially suited me. The large peaceful rooms, the well-arranged furniture, the clear wide windows, the balcony outside, looking down on a fine antique street, where Sundays and holidays seemed always to abide—so quiet was its atmosphere, so clean its pavement—these things pleased me well.
One child in a household of grown people is usually made very much of, and in a quiet way I was a good deal taken notice of by Mrs. Bretton, who had been left a widow, with one son, before I knew her; her husband, a physician, having died while she was yet a young and handsome woman.
She was not young, as I remember her, but she was still handsome, tall, well-made, and though dark for an Englishwoman, yet wearing always the clearness of health in her brunette cheek, and its vivacity in a pair of fine, cheerful black eyes. People esteemed it a grievous pity that she had not conferred her complexion on her son, whose eyes were blue—though, even in boyhood, very piercing—and the colour of his long hair such as friends did not venture to specify, except as the sun shone on it, when they called it golden. He inherited the lines of his mother's features, however; also her good teeth, her stature (or the promise of her stature, for he was not yet full-grown), and, what was better, her health without flaw, and her spirits of that tone and equality which are better than a fortune to the possessor.
In the autumn of the year —— I was staying at Bretton; my godmother having come in person to claim me of the kinsfolk with whom was at that time fixed my permanent residence. I believe she then plainly saw events coming, whose very shadow I scarce guessed; yet of which the faint suspicion sufficed to impart unsettled sadness, and made me glad to change scene and society.
Time always flowed smoothly for me at my godmother's side; not with tumultuous swiftness, but blandly, like the gliding of a full river through a plain. My visits to her resembled the sojourn of Christian and Hopeful beside a certain pleasant stream, with "green trees on each bank, and meadows beautified with lilies all the year round." The charm of variety there was not, nor the excitement of incident; but I liked peace so well, and sought stimulus so little, that when the latter came I almost felt it a disturbance, and wished rather it had still held aloof.
One day a letter was received of which the contents evidently caused Mrs. Bretton surprise and some concern. I thought at first it was from home, and trembled, expecting I know not what disastrous communication: to me, however, no reference was made, and the cloud seemed to pass.
The next day, on my return from a long walk, I found, as I entered my bedroom, an unexpected change. In, addition to my own French bed in its shady recess, appeared in a corner a small crib, draped with white; and in addition to my mahogany chest of drawers, I saw a tiny rosewood chest. I stood still, gazed, and considered.
"Of what are these things the signs and tokens?" I asked. The answer was obvious. "A second guest is coming: Mrs. Bretton expects other visitors."
On descending to dinner, explanations ensued. A little girl, I was told, would shortly be my companion: the daughter of a friend and distant relation of the late Dr. Bretton's. This little girl, it was added, had recently lost her mother; though, indeed, Mrs. Bretton ere long subjoined, the loss was not so great as might at first appear. Mrs. Home (Home it seems was the name) had been a very pretty, but a giddy, careless woman, who had neglected her child, and disappointed and disheartened her husband. So far from congenial had the union proved, that separation at last ensued—separation by mutual consent, not after any legal process. Soon after this event, the lady having over-exerted herself at a ball, caught cold, took a fever, and died after a very brief illness. Her husband, naturally a man of very sensitive feelings, and shocked inexpressibly by too sudden communication of the news, could hardly, it seems, now be persuaded but that some over-severity on his part—some deficiency in patience and indulgence—had contributed to hasten her end. He had brooded over this idea till his spirits were seriously affected; the medical men insisted on travelling being tried as a remedy, and meanwhile Mrs. Bretton had offered to take charge of his little girl. "And I hope," added my godmother in conclusion, "the child will not be like her mamma; as silly and frivolous a little flirt as ever sensible man was weak enough to marry. For," said she, "Mr. Home is a sensible man in his way, though not very practical: he is fond of science, and lives half his life in a laboratory trying experiments—a thing his butterfly wife could neither comprehend nor endure; and indeed" confessed my godmother, "I should not have liked it myself."
In answer to a question of mine, she further informed me that her late husband used to say, Mr. Home had derived this scientific turn from a maternal uncle, a French savant; for he came, it seems; of mixed French and Scottish origin, and had connections now living in France, of whom more than one wrote de before his name, and called himself noble.
That same evening at nine o'clock, a servant was despatched to meet the coach by which our little visitor was expected. Mrs. Bretton and I sat alone in the drawing-room waiting her coming; John Graham Bretton being absent on a visit to one of his schoolfellows who lived in the country. My godmother read the evening paper while she waited; I sewed. It was a wet night; the rain lashed the panes, and the wind sounded angry and restless.
"Poor child!" said Mrs. Bretton from time to time. "What weather for her journey! I wish she were safe here."
A little before ten the door-bell announced Warren's return. No sooner was the door opened than I ran down into the hall; there lay a trunk and some band-boxes, beside them stood a person like a nurse-girl, and at the foot of the staircase was Warren with a shawled bundle in his arms.
"Is that the child?" I asked.
"Yes, miss."
I would have opened the shawl, and tried to get a peep at the face, but it was hastily turned from me to Warren's shoulder.
"Put me down, please," said a small voice when Warren opened the drawing-room door, "and take off this shawl," continued the speaker, extracting with its minute hand the pin, and with a sort of fastidious haste doffing the clumsy wrapping. The creature which now appeared made a deft attempt to fold the shawl; but the drapery was much too heavy and large to be sustained or wielded by those hands and arms. "Give it to Harriet, please," was then the direction, "and she can put it away." This said, it turned and fixed its eyes on Mrs. Bretton.
"Come here, little dear," said that lady. "Come and let me see if you are cold and damp: come and let me warm you at the fire."
The child advanced promptly. Relieved of her wrapping, she appeared exceedingly tiny; but was a neat, completely-fashioned little figure, light, slight, and straight. Seated on my godmother's ample lap, she looked a mere doll; her neck, delicate as wax, her head of silky curls, increased, I thought, the resemblance.
Mrs. Bretton talked in little fond phrases as she chafed the child's hands, arms, and feet; first she was considered with a wistful gaze, but soon a smile answered her. Mrs. Bretton was not generally a caressing woman: even with her deeply-cherished son, her manner was rarely sentimental, often the reverse; but when the small stranger smiled at her, she kissed it, asking, "What is my little one's name?"
"Missy."
"But besides Missy?"
"Polly, papa calls her."
"Will Polly be content to live with me?"
"Not always; but till papa comes home. Papa is gone away." She shook her head expressively.
"He will return to Polly, or send for her."
"Will he, ma'am? Do you know he will?"
"I think so."
"But Harriet thinks not: at least not for a long while. He is ill."
Her eyes filled. She drew her hand from Mrs. Bretton's and made a movement to leave her lap; it was at first resisted, but she said—"Please, I wish to go: I can sit on a stool."
She was allowed to slip down from the knee, and taking a footstool, she carried it to a corner where the shade was deep, and there seated herself. Mrs. Bretton, though a commanding, and in grave matters even a peremptory woman, was often passive in trifles: she allowed the child her way. She said to me, "Take no notice at present." But I did take notice: I watched Polly rest her small elbow on her small knee, her head on her hand; I observed her draw a square inch or two of pocket-handkerchief from the doll-pocket of her doll-skirt, and then I heard her weep. Other children in grief or pain cry aloud, without shame or restraint; but this being wept: the tiniest occasional sniff testified to her emotion. Mrs. Bretton did not hear it: which was quite as well. Ere long, a voice, issuing from the corner, demanded—"May the bell be rung for Harriet!"
I rang; the nurse was summoned and came.
"Harriet, I must be put to bed," said her little mistress. "You must ask where my bed is."
Harriet signified that she had already made that inquiry.
"Ask if you sleep with me, Harriet."
"No, Missy," said the nurse: "you are to share this young lady's room," designating me.
Missy did not leave her seat, but I saw her eyes seek me. After some minutes' silent scrutiny, she emerged from her corner.
"I wish you, ma'am, good night," said she to Mrs. Bretton; but she passed me mute.
"Good-night, Polly," I said.
"No need to say good-night, since we sleep in the same chamber," was the reply, with which she vanished from the drawing-room. We heard Harriet propose to carry her up-stairs. "No need," was again her answer—"no need, no need:" and her small step toiled wearily up the staircase.
On going to bed an hour afterwards, I found her still wide awake. She had arranged her pillows so as to support her little person in a sitting posture: her hands, placed one within the other, rested quietly on the sheet, with an old-fashioned calm most unchildlike. I abstained from speaking to her for some time, but just before extinguishing the light, I recommended her to lie down.
"By and by," was the answer.
"But you will take cold, Missy."
She took some tiny article of raiment from the chair at her crib side, and with it covered her shoulders. I suffered her to do as she pleased. Listening awhile in the darkness, I was aware that she still wept,—wept under restraint, quietly and cautiously.
On awaking with daylight, a trickling of water caught my ear. Behold! there she was risen and mounted on a stool near the washstand, with pains and difficulty inclining the ewer (which she could not lift) so as to pour its contents into the basin. It was curious to watch her as she washed and dressed, so small, busy, and noiseless. Evidently she was little accustomed to perform her own toilet; and the buttons, strings, hooks and eyes, offered difficulties which she encountered with a perseverance good to witness. She folded her night-dress, she smoothed the drapery of her couch quite neatly; withdrawing into a corner, where the sweep of the white curtain concealed her, she became still. I half rose, and advanced my head to see how she was occupied. On her knees, with her forehead bent on her hands, I perceived that she was praying.
Her nurse tapped at the door. She started up.
"I am dressed, Harriet," said she; "I have dressed myself, but I do not feel neat. Make me neat!"
"Why did you dress yourself, Missy?"
"Hush! speak low, Harriet, for fear of waking the girl" (meaning me, who now lay with my eyes shut). "I dressed myself to learn, against the time you leave me."
"Do you want me to go?"
"When you are cross, I have many a time wanted you to go, but not now.
Tie my sash straight; make my hair smooth, please."
"Your sash is straight enough. What a particular little body you are!"
"It must be tied again. Please to tie it."
"There, then. When I am gone you must get that young lady to dress you."
"On no account."
"Why? She is a very nice young lady. I hope you mean to behave prettily to her, Missy, and not show your airs."
"She shall dress me on no account."
"Comical little thing!"
"You are not passing the comb straight through my hair, Harriet; the line will be crooked."
"Ay, you are ill to please. Does that suit?"
"Pretty well. Where should I go now that I am dressed?"
"I will take you into the breakfast-room."
"Come, then."
They proceeded to the door. She stopped.
"Oh! Harriet, I wish this was papa's house! I don't know these people."
"Be a good child, Missy."
"I am good, but I ache here;" putting her hand to her heart, and moaning while she reiterated, "Papa! papa!"
I roused myself and started up, to check this scene while it was yet within bounds.
"Say good-morning to the young lady," dictated Harriet. She said, "Good-morning," and then followed her nurse from the room. Harriet temporarily left that same day, to go to her own friends, who lived in the neighbourhood.
On descending, I found Paulina (the child called herself Polly, but her full name was Paulina Mary) seated at the breakfast-table, by Mrs. Bretton's side; a mug of milk stood before her, a morsel of bread filled her hand, which lay passive on the table-cloth: she was not eating.
"How we shall conciliate this little creature," said Mrs. Bretton to me, "I don't know: she tastes nothing, and by her looks, she has not slept."
I expressed my confidence in the effects of time and kindness.
"If she were to take a fancy to anybody in the house, she would soon settle; but not till then," replied Mrs. Bretton.
CHAPTER II.PAULINA.Some days elapsed, and it appeared she was not likely to take much of a fancy to anybody in the house. She was not exactly naughty or wilful: she was far from disobedient; but an object less conducive to comfort—to tranquillity even—than she presented, it was scarcely possible to have before one's eyes. She moped: no grown person could have performed that uncheering business better; no furrowed face of adult exile, longing for Europe at Europe's antipodes, ever bore more legibly the signs of home sickness than did her infant visage. She seemed growing old and unearthly. I, Lucy Snowe, plead guiltless of that curse, an overheated and discursive imagination; but whenever, opening a room-door, I found her seated in a corner alone, her head in her pigmy hand, that room seemed to me not inhabited, but haunted.
And again, when of moonlight nights, on waking, I beheld her figure, white and conspicuous in its night-dress, kneeling upright in bed, and praying like some Catholic or Methodist enthusiast—some precocious fanatic or untimely saint—I scarcely know what thoughts I had; but they ran risk of being hardly more rational and healthy than that child's mind must have been.
I seldom caught a word of her prayers, for they were whispered low: sometimes, indeed, they were not whispered at all, but put up unuttered; such rare sentences as reached my ear still bore the burden, "Papa; my dear papa!" This, I perceived, was a one-idea'd nature; betraying that monomaniac tendency I have ever thought the most unfortunate with which man or woman can be cursed.
What might have been the end of this fretting, had it continued unchecked, can only be conjectured: it received, however, a sudden turn.
One afternoon, Mrs. Bretton, coaxing her from her usual station in a corner, had lifted her into the window-seat, and, by way of occupying her attention, told her to watch the passengers and count how many ladies should go down the street in a given time. She had sat listlessly, hardly looking, and not counting, when—my eye being fixed on hers—I witnessed in its iris and pupil a startling transfiguration. These sudden, dangerous natures--sensitive as they are called—offer many a curious spectacle to those whom a cooler temperament has secured from participation in their angular vagaries. The fixed and heavy gaze swum, trembled, then glittered in fire; the small, overcast brow cleared; the trivial and dejected features lit up; the sad countenance vanished, and in its place appeared a sudden eagerness, an intense expectancy. "It is!" were her words.
Like a bird or a shaft, or any other swift thing, she was gone from the room. How she got the house-door open I cannot tell; probably it might be ajar; perhaps Warren was in the way and obeyed her behest, which would be impetuous enough. I—watching calmly from the window—saw her, in her black frock and tiny braided apron (to pinafores she had an antipathy), dart half the length of the street; and, as I was on the point of turning, and quietly announcing to Mrs. Bretton that the child was run out mad, and ought instantly to be pursued, I saw her caught up, and rapt at once from my cool observation, and from the wondering stare of the passengers. A gentleman had done this good turn, and now, covering her with his cloak, advanced to restore her to the house whence he had seen her issue.
I concluded he would leave her in a servant's charge and withdraw; but he entered: having tarried a little while below, he came up-stairs.
His reception immediately explained that he was known to Mrs. Bretton. She recognised him; she greeted him, and yet she was fluttered, surprised, taken unawares. Her look and manner were even expostulatory; and in reply to these, rather than her words, he said,—"I could not help it, madam: I found it impossible to leave the country without seeing with my own eyes how she settled."
"But you will unsettle her."
"I hope not. And how is papa's little Polly?"
This question he addressed to Paulina, as he sat down and placed her gently on the ground before him.
"How is Polly's papa?" was the reply, as she leaned on his knee, and gazed up into his face.
It was not a noisy, not a wordy scene: for that I was thankful; but it was a scene of feeling too brimful, and which, because the cup did not foam up high or furiously overflow, only oppressed one the more. On all occasions of vehement, unrestrained expansion, a sense of disdain or ridicule comes to the weary spectator's relief; whereas I have ever felt most burdensome that sort of sensibility which bends of its own will, a giant slave under the sway of good sense.
Mr. Home was a stern-featured—perhaps I should rather say, a hard-featured man: his forehead was knotty, and his cheekbones were marked and prominent. The character of his face was quite Scotch; but there was feeling in his eye, and emotion in his now agitated countenance. His northern accent in speaking harmonised with his physiognomy. He was at once proud-looking and homely-looking. He laid his hand on the child's uplifted head. She said—"Kiss Polly."
He kissed her. I wished she would utter some hysterical cry, so that I might get relief and be at ease. She made wonderfully little noise: she seemed to have got what she wanted--all she wanted, and to be in a trance of content. Neither in mien nor in features was this creature like her sire, and yet she was of his strain: her mind had been filled from his, as the cup from the flagon.
Indisputably, Mr. Home owned manly self-control, however he might secretly feel on some matters. "Polly," he said, looking down on his little girl, "go into the hall; you will see papa's great-coat lying on a chair; put your hand into the pockets, you will find a pocket-handkerchief there; bring it to me."
She obeyed; went and returned deftly and nimbly. He was talking to Mrs. Bretton when she came back, and she waited with the handkerchief in her hand. It was a picture, in its way, to see her, with her tiny stature, and trim, neat shape, standing at his knee. Seeing that he continued to talk, apparently unconscious of her return, she took his hand, opened the unresisting fingers, insinuated into them the handkerchief, and closed them upon it one by one. He still seemed not to see or to feel her; but by-and-by, he lifted her to his knee; she nestled against him, and though neither looked at nor spoke to the other for an hour following, I suppose both were satisfied.
During tea, the minute thing's movements and behaviour gave, as usual, full occupation to the eye. First she directed Warren, as he placed the chairs.
"Put papa's chair here, and mine near it, between papa and Mrs.
Bretton: I must hand his tea."
She took her own seat, and beckoned with her hand to her father.
"Be near me, as if we were at home, papa."
And again, as she intercepted his cup in passing, and would stir the sugar, and put in the cream herself, "I always did it for you at home; papa: nobody could do it as well, not even your own self."
Throughout the meal she continued her attentions: rather absurd they were. The sugar-tongs were too wide for one of her hands, and she had to use both in wielding them; the weight of the silver cream-ewer, the bread-and-butter plates, the very cup and saucer, tasked her insufficient strength and dexterity; but she would lift this, hand that, and luckily contrived through it all to break nothing. Candidly speaking, I thought her a little busy-body; but her father, blind like other parents, seemed perfectly content to let her wait on him, and even wonderfully soothed by her offices.
"She is my comfort!" he could not help saying to Mrs. Bretton. That lady had her own "comfort" and nonpareil on a much larger scale, and, for the moment, absent; so she sympathised with his foible.
This second "comfort" came on the stage in the course of the evening. I knew this day had been fixed for his return, and was aware that Mrs. Bretton had been expecting him through all its hours. We were seated round the fire, after tea, when Graham joined our circle: I should rather say, broke it up—for, of course, his arrival made a bustle; and then, as Mr. Graham was fasting, there was refreshment to be provided. He and Mr. Home met as old acquaintance; of the little girl he took
no notice for a time.
His meal over, and numerous questions from his mother answered, he turned from the table to the hearth. Opposite where he had placed himself was seated Mr. Home, and at his elbow, the child. When I say child I use an inappropriate and undescriptive term—a term suggesting any picture rather than that of the demure little person in a mourning frock and white chemisette, that might just have fitted a good-sized doll—perched now on a high chair beside a stand, whereon was her toy work-box of white varnished wood, and holding in her hands a shred of a handkerchief, which she was professing to hem, and at which she bored perseveringly with a needle, that in her fingers seemed almost a skewer, pricking herself ever and anon, marking the cambric with a track of minute red dots; occasionally starting when the perverse weapon—swerving from her control—inflicted a deeper stab than usual; but still silent, diligent, absorbed, womanly.
Graham was at that time a handsome, faithless-looking youth of sixteen. I say faithless-looking, not because he was really of a very perfidious disposition, but because the epithet strikes me as proper to describe the fair, Celtic (not Saxon) character of his good looks; his waved light auburn hair, his supple symmetry, his smile frequent, and destitute neither of fascination nor of subtlety (in no bad sense). A spoiled, whimsical boy he was in those days.
"Mother," he said, after eyeing the little figure before him in silence for some time, and when the temporary absence of Mr. Home from the room relieved him from the half-laughing bashfulness, which was all he knew of timidity—-"Mother, I see a young lady in the present society to whom I have not been introduced."
"Mr. Home's little girl, I suppose you mean," said his mother.
"Indeed, ma'am," replied her son, "I consider your expression of the least ceremonious: Miss Home I should certainly have said, in venturing to speak of the gentlewoman to whom I allude."
"Now, Graham, I will not have that child teased. Don't flatter yourself that I shall suffer you to make her your butt."
"Miss Home," pursued Graham, undeterred by his mother's remonstrance, "might I have the honour to introduce myself, since no one else seems willing to render you and me that service? Your slave, John Graham Bretton."
She looked at him; he rose and bowed quite gravely. She deliberately put down thimble, scissors, work; descended with precaution from her perch, and curtsying with unspeakable seriousness, said, "How do you do?"
"I have the honour to be in fair health, only in some measure fatigued with a hurried journey. I hope, ma'am, I see you well?"
"Tor-rer-ably well," was the ambitious reply of the little woman and she now essayed to regain her former elevation, but finding this could not be done without some climbing and straining—a sacrifice of decorum not to be thought of—and being utterly disdainful of aid in the presence of a strange young gentleman, she relinquished the high chair for a low stool: towards that low stool
Graham drew in his chair.
"I hope, ma'am, the present residence, my mother's house, appears to you a convenient place of abode?"
"Not par-tic-er-er-ly; I want to go home."
"A natural and laudable desire, ma'am; but one which, notwithstanding,
I shall do my best to oppose. I reckon on being able to get out of you
a little of that precious commodity called amusement, which mamma and
Mistress Snowe there fail to yield me."
"I shall have to go with papa soon: I shall not stay long at your mother's."
"Yes, yes; you will stay with me, I am sure. I have a pony on which you shall ride, and no end of books with pictures to show you."
"Are you going to live here now?"
"I am. Does that please you? Do you like me?"
"No."
"Why?"
"I think you queer."
"My face, ma'am?"
"Your face and all about you: You have long red hair."
"Auburn hair, if you please: mamma, calls it auburn, or golden, and so do all her friends. But even with my 'long red hair'" (and he waved his mane with a sort of triumph—tawny he himself well knew that it was, and he was proud of the leonine hue), "I cannot possibly be queerer than is your ladyship."
"You call me queer?"
"Certainly."
(After a pause), "I think I shall go to bed."
"A little thing like you ought to have been in bed many hours since; but you probably sat up in the expectation of seeing me?"
"No, indeed."
"You certainly wished to enjoy the pleasure of my society. You knew I was coming home, and would wait to have a look at me."
"I sat up for papa, and not for you."
"Very good, Miss Home. I am going to be a favourite: preferred before papa soon, I daresay."
She wished Mrs. Bretton and myself good-night; she seemed hesitating whether Graham's deserts entitled him to the same attention, when he caught her up with one hand, and with that one hand held her poised aloft above his head. She saw herself thus lifted up on high, in the glass over the fireplace. The suddenness, the freedom, the disrespect of the action were too much.
"For shame, Mr. Graham!" was her indignant cry, "put me down!"—and when again on her feet, "I wonder what you would think of me if I were to treat you in that way, lifting you with my hand" (raising that mighty member) "as Warren lifts the little cat."
So saying, she departed.
Villette
By Charlotte Bronte
CHAPTER I
BRETTON
My godmother lived in a handsome house in the clean and ancient town of Bretton. Her husband's family had been residents there for generations, and bore, indeed, the name of their birthplace—Bretton of Bretton: whether by coincidence, or because some remote ancestor had been a personage of sufficient importance to leave his name to his neighbourhood, I know not.
When I was a girl I went to Bretton about twice a year, and well I liked the visit. The house and its inmates specially suited me. The large peaceful rooms, the well-arranged furniture, the clear wide windows, the balcony outside, looking down on a fine antique street, where Sundays and holidays seemed always to abide—so quiet was its atmosphere, so clean its pavement—these things pleased me well.
One child in a household of grown people is usually made very much of, and in a quiet way I was a good deal taken notice of by Mrs. Bretton, who had been left a widow, with one son, before I knew her; her husband, a physician, having died while she was yet a young and handsome woman.
She was not young, as I remember her, but she was still handsome, tall, well-made, and though dark for an Englishwoman, yet wearing always the clearness of health in her brunette cheek, and its vivacity in a pair of fine, cheerful black eyes. People esteemed it a grievous pity that she had not conferred her complexion on her son, whose eyes were blue—though, even in boyhood, very piercing—and the colour of his long hair such as friends did not venture to specify, except as the sun shone on it, when they called it golden. He inherited the lines of his mother's features, however; also her good teeth, her stature (or the promise of her stature, for he was not yet full-grown), and, what was better, her health without flaw, and her spirits of that tone and equality which are better than a fortune to the possessor.
In the autumn of the year —— I was staying at Bretton; my godmother having come in person to claim me of the kinsfolk with whom was at that time fixed my permanent residence. I believe she then plainly saw events coming, whose very shadow I scarce guessed; yet of which the faint suspicion sufficed to impart unsettled sadness, and made me glad to change scene and society.
Time always flowed smoothly for me at my godmother's side; not with tumultuous swiftness, but blandly, like the gliding of a full river through a plain. My visits to her resembled the sojourn of Christian and Hopeful beside a certain pleasant stream, with "green trees on each bank, and meadows beautified with lilies all the year round." The charm of variety there was not, nor the excitement of incident; but I liked peace so well, and sought stimulus so little, that when the latter came I almost felt it a disturbance, and wished rather it had still held aloof.
One day a letter was received of which the contents evidently caused Mrs. Bretton surprise and some concern. I thought at first it was from home, and trembled, expecting I know not what disastrous communication: to me, however, no reference was made, and the cloud seemed to pass.
The next day, on my return from a long walk, I found, as I entered my bedroom, an unexpected change. In, addition to my own French bed in its shady recess, appeared in a corner a small crib, draped with white; and in addition to my mahogany chest of drawers, I saw a tiny rosewood chest. I stood still, gazed, and considered.
"Of what are these things the signs and tokens?" I asked. The answer was obvious. "A second guest is coming: Mrs. Bretton expects other visitors."
On descending to dinner, explanations ensued. A little girl, I was told, would shortly be my companion: the daughter of a friend and distant relation of the late Dr. Bretton's. This little girl, it was added, had recently lost her mother; though, indeed, Mrs. Bretton ere long subjoined, the loss was not so great as might at first appear. Mrs. Home (Home it seems was the name) had been a very pretty, but a giddy, careless woman, who had neglected her child, and disappointed and disheartened her husband. So far from congenial had the union proved, that separation at last ensued—separation by mutual consent, not after any legal process. Soon after this event, the lady having over-exerted herself at a ball, caught cold, took a fever, and died after a very brief illness. Her husband, naturally a man of very sensitive feelings, and shocked inexpressibly by too sudden communication of the news, could hardly, it seems, now be persuaded but that some over-severity on his part—some deficiency in patience and indulgence—had contributed to hasten her end. He had brooded over this idea till his spirits were seriously affected; the medical men insisted on travelling being tried as a remedy, and meanwhile Mrs. Bretton had offered to take charge of his little girl. "And I hope," added my godmother in conclusion, "the child will not be like her mamma; as silly and frivolous a little flirt as ever sensible man was weak enough to marry. For," said she, "Mr. Home is a sensible man in his way, though not very practical: he is fond of science, and lives half his life in a laboratory trying experiments—a thing his butterfly wife could neither comprehend nor endure; and indeed" confessed my godmother, "I should not have liked it myself."
In answer to a question of mine, she further informed me that her late husband used to say, Mr. Home had derived this scientific turn from a maternal uncle, a French savant; for he came, it seems; of mixed French and Scottish origin, and had connections now living in France, of whom more than one wrote de before his name, and called himself noble.
That same evening at nine o'clock, a servant was despatched to meet the coach by which our little visitor was expected. Mrs. Bretton and I sat alone in the drawing-room waiting her coming; John Graham Bretton being absent on a visit to one of his schoolfellows who lived in the country. My godmother read the evening paper while she waited; I sewed. It was a wet night; the rain lashed the panes, and the wind sounded angry and restless.
"Poor child!" said Mrs. Bretton from time to time. "What weather for her journey! I wish she were safe here."
A little before ten the door-bell announced Warren's return. No sooner was the door opened than I ran down into the hall; there lay a trunk and some band-boxes, beside them stood a person like a nurse-girl, and at the foot of the staircase was Warren with a shawled bundle in his arms.
"Is that the child?" I asked.
"Yes, miss."
I would have opened the shawl, and tried to get a peep at the face, but it was hastily turned from me to Warren's shoulder.
"Put me down, please," said a small voice when Warren opened the drawing-room door, "and take off this shawl," continued the speaker, extracting with its minute hand the pin, and with a sort of fastidious haste doffing the clumsy wrapping. The creature which now appeared made a deft attempt to fold the shawl; but the drapery was much too heavy and large to be sustained or wielded by those hands and arms. "Give it to Harriet, please," was then the direction, "and she can put it away." This said, it turned and fixed its eyes on Mrs. Bretton.
"Come here, little dear," said that lady. "Come and let me see if you are cold and damp: come and let me warm you at the fire."
The child advanced promptly. Relieved of her wrapping, she appeared exceedingly tiny; but was a neat, completely-fashioned little figure, light, slight, and straight. Seated on my godmother's ample lap, she looked a mere doll; her neck, delicate as wax, her head of silky curls, increased, I thought, the resemblance.
Mrs. Bretton talked in little fond phrases as she chafed the child's hands, arms, and feet; first she was considered with a wistful gaze, but soon a smile answered her. Mrs. Bretton was not generally a caressing woman: even with her deeply-cherished son, her manner was rarely sentimental, often the reverse; but when the small stranger smiled at her, she kissed it, asking, "What is my little one's name?"
"Missy."
"But besides Missy?"
"Polly, papa calls her."
"Will Polly be content to live with me?"
"Not always; but till papa comes home. Papa is gone away." She shook her head expressively.
"He will return to Polly, or send for her."
"Will he, ma'am? Do you know he will?"
"I think so."
"But Harriet thinks not: at least not for a long while. He is ill."
Her eyes filled. She drew her hand from Mrs. Bretton's and made a movement to leave her lap; it was at first resisted, but she said—"Please, I wish to go: I can sit on a stool."
She was allowed to slip down from the knee, and taking a footstool, she carried it to a corner where the shade was deep, and there seated herself. Mrs. Bretton, though a commanding, and in grave matters even a peremptory woman, was often passive in trifles: she allowed the child her way. She said to me, "Take no notice at present." But I did take notice: I watched Polly rest her small elbow on her small knee, her head on her hand; I observed her draw a square inch or two of pocket-handkerchief from the doll-pocket of her doll-skirt, and then I heard her weep. Other children in grief or pain cry aloud, without shame or restraint; but this being wept: the tiniest occasional sniff testified to her emotion. Mrs. Bretton did not hear it: which was quite as well. Ere long, a voice, issuing from the corner, demanded—"May the bell be rung for Harriet!"
I rang; the nurse was summoned and came.
"Harriet, I must be put to bed," said her little mistress. "You must ask where my bed is."
Harriet signified that she had already made that inquiry.
"Ask if you sleep with me, Harriet."
"No, Missy," said the nurse: "you are to share this young lady's room," designating me.
Missy did not leave her seat, but I saw her eyes seek me. After some minutes' silent scrutiny, she emerged from her corner.
"I wish you, ma'am, good night," said she to Mrs. Bretton; but she passed me mute.
"Good-night, Polly," I said.
"No need to say good-night, since we sleep in the same chamber," was the reply, with which she vanished from the drawing-room. We heard Harriet propose to carry her up-stairs. "No need," was again her answer—"no need, no need:" and her small step toiled wearily up the staircase.
On going to bed an hour afterwards, I found her still wide awake. She had arranged her pillows so as to support her little person in a sitting posture: her hands, placed one within the other, rested quietly on the sheet, with an old-fashioned calm most unchildlike. I abstained from speaking to her for some time, but just before extinguishing the light, I recommended her to lie down.
"By and by," was the answer.
"But you will take cold, Missy."
She took some tiny article of raiment from the chair at her crib side, and with it covered her shoulders. I suffered her to do as she pleased. Listening awhile in the darkness, I was aware that she still wept,—wept under restraint, quietly and cautiously.
On awaking with daylight, a trickling of water caught my ear. Behold! there she was risen and mounted on a stool near the washstand, with pains and difficulty inclining the ewer (which she could not lift) so as to pour its contents into the basin. It was curious to watch her as she washed and dressed, so small, busy, and noiseless. Evidently she was little accustomed to perform her own toilet; and the buttons, strings, hooks and eyes, offered difficulties which she encountered with a perseverance good to witness. She folded her night-dress, she smoothed the drapery of her couch quite neatly; withdrawing into a corner, where the sweep of the white curtain concealed her, she became still. I half rose, and advanced my head to see how she was occupied. On her knees, with her forehead bent on her hands, I perceived that she was praying.
Her nurse tapped at the door. She started up.
"I am dressed, Harriet," said she; "I have dressed myself, but I do not feel neat. Make me neat!"
"Why did you dress yourself, Missy?"
"Hush! speak low, Harriet, for fear of waking the girl" (meaning me, who now lay with my eyes shut). "I dressed myself to learn, against the time you leave me."
"Do you want me to go?"
"When you are cross, I have many a time wanted you to go, but not now.
Tie my sash straight; make my hair smooth, please."
"Your sash is straight enough. What a particular little body you are!"
"It must be tied again. Please to tie it."
"There, then. When I am gone you must get that young lady to dress you."
"On no account."
"Why? She is a very nice young lady. I hope you mean to behave prettily to her, Missy, and not show your airs."
"She shall dress me on no account."
"Comical little thing!"
"You are not passing the comb straight through my hair, Harriet; the line will be crooked."
"Ay, you are ill to please. Does that suit?"
"Pretty well. Where should I go now that I am dressed?"
"I will take you into the breakfast-room."
"Come, then."
They proceeded to the door. She stopped.
"Oh! Harriet, I wish this was papa's house! I don't know these people."
"Be a good child, Missy."
"I am good, but I ache here;" putting her hand to her heart, and moaning while she reiterated, "Papa! papa!"
I roused myself and started up, to check this scene while it was yet within bounds.
"Say good-morning to the young lady," dictated Harriet. She said, "Good-morning," and then followed her nurse from the room. Harriet temporarily left that same day, to go to her own friends, who lived in the neighbourhood.
On descending, I found Paulina (the child called herself Polly, but her full name was Paulina Mary) seated at the breakfast-table, by Mrs. Bretton's side; a mug of milk stood before her, a morsel of bread filled her hand, which lay passive on the table-cloth: she was not eating.
"How we shall conciliate this little creature," said Mrs. Bretton to me, "I don't know: she tastes nothing, and by her looks, she has not slept."
I expressed my confidence in the effects of time and kindness.
"If she were to take a fancy to anybody in the house, she would soon settle; but not till then," replied Mrs. Bretton.
CHAPTER II.PAULINA.Some days elapsed, and it appeared she was not likely to take much of a fancy to anybody in the house. She was not exactly naughty or wilful: she was far from disobedient; but an object less conducive to comfort—to tranquillity even—than she presented, it was scarcely possible to have before one's eyes. She moped: no grown person could have performed that uncheering business better; no furrowed face of adult exile, longing for Europe at Europe's antipodes, ever bore more legibly the signs of home sickness than did her infant visage. She seemed growing old and unearthly. I, Lucy Snowe, plead guiltless of that curse, an overheated and discursive imagination; but whenever, opening a room-door, I found her seated in a corner alone, her head in her pigmy hand, that room seemed to me not inhabited, but haunted.
And again, when of moonlight nights, on waking, I beheld her figure, white and conspicuous in its night-dress, kneeling upright in bed, and praying like some Catholic or Methodist enthusiast—some precocious fanatic or untimely saint—I scarcely know what thoughts I had; but they ran risk of being hardly more rational and healthy than that child's mind must have been.
I seldom caught a word of her prayers, for they were whispered low: sometimes, indeed, they were not whispered at all, but put up unuttered; such rare sentences as reached my ear still bore the burden, "Papa; my dear papa!" This, I perceived, was a one-idea'd nature; betraying that monomaniac tendency I have ever thought the most unfortunate with which man or woman can be cursed.
What might have been the end of this fretting, had it continued unchecked, can only be conjectured: it received, however, a sudden turn.
One afternoon, Mrs. Bretton, coaxing her from her usual station in a corner, had lifted her into the window-seat, and, by way of occupying her attention, told her to watch the passengers and count how many ladies should go down the street in a given time. She had sat listlessly, hardly looking, and not counting, when—my eye being fixed on hers—I witnessed in its iris and pupil a startling transfiguration. These sudden, dangerous natures--sensitive as they are called—offer many a curious spectacle to those whom a cooler temperament has secured from participation in their angular vagaries. The fixed and heavy gaze swum, trembled, then glittered in fire; the small, overcast brow cleared; the trivial and dejected features lit up; the sad countenance vanished, and in its place appeared a sudden eagerness, an intense expectancy. "It is!" were her words.
Like a bird or a shaft, or any other swift thing, she was gone from the room. How she got the house-door open I cannot tell; probably it might be ajar; perhaps Warren was in the way and obeyed her behest, which would be impetuous enough. I—watching calmly from the window—saw her, in her black frock and tiny braided apron (to pinafores she had an antipathy), dart half the length of the street; and, as I was on the point of turning, and quietly announcing to Mrs. Bretton that the child was run out mad, and ought instantly to be pursued, I saw her caught up, and rapt at once from my cool observation, and from the wondering stare of the passengers. A gentleman had done this good turn, and now, covering her with his cloak, advanced to restore her to the house whence he had seen her issue.
I concluded he would leave her in a servant's charge and withdraw; but he entered: having tarried a little while below, he came up-stairs.
His reception immediately explained that he was known to Mrs. Bretton. She recognised him; she greeted him, and yet she was fluttered, surprised, taken unawares. Her look and manner were even expostulatory; and in reply to these, rather than her words, he said,—"I could not help it, madam: I found it impossible to leave the country without seeing with my own eyes how she settled."
"But you will unsettle her."
"I hope not. And how is papa's little Polly?"
This question he addressed to Paulina, as he sat down and placed her gently on the ground before him.
"How is Polly's papa?" was the reply, as she leaned on his knee, and gazed up into his face.
It was not a noisy, not a wordy scene: for that I was thankful; but it was a scene of feeling too brimful, and which, because the cup did not foam up high or furiously overflow, only oppressed one the more. On all occasions of vehement, unrestrained expansion, a sense of disdain or ridicule comes to the weary spectator's relief; whereas I have ever felt most burdensome that sort of sensibility which bends of its own will, a giant slave under the sway of good sense.
Mr. Home was a stern-featured—perhaps I should rather say, a hard-featured man: his forehead was knotty, and his cheekbones were marked and prominent. The character of his face was quite Scotch; but there was feeling in his eye, and emotion in his now agitated countenance. His northern accent in speaking harmonised with his physiognomy. He was at once proud-looking and homely-looking. He laid his hand on the child's uplifted head. She said—"Kiss Polly."
He kissed her. I wished she would utter some hysterical cry, so that I might get relief and be at ease. She made wonderfully little noise: she seemed to have got what she wanted--all she wanted, and to be in a trance of content. Neither in mien nor in features was this creature like her sire, and yet she was of his strain: her mind had been filled from his, as the cup from the flagon.
Indisputably, Mr. Home owned manly self-control, however he might secretly feel on some matters. "Polly," he said, looking down on his little girl, "go into the hall; you will see papa's great-coat lying on a chair; put your hand into the pockets, you will find a pocket-handkerchief there; bring it to me."
She obeyed; went and returned deftly and nimbly. He was talking to Mrs. Bretton when she came back, and she waited with the handkerchief in her hand. It was a picture, in its way, to see her, with her tiny stature, and trim, neat shape, standing at his knee. Seeing that he continued to talk, apparently unconscious of her return, she took his hand, opened the unresisting fingers, insinuated into them the handkerchief, and closed them upon it one by one. He still seemed not to see or to feel her; but by-and-by, he lifted her to his knee; she nestled against him, and though neither looked at nor spoke to the other for an hour following, I suppose both were satisfied.
During tea, the minute thing's movements and behaviour gave, as usual, full occupation to the eye. First she directed Warren, as he placed the chairs.
"Put papa's chair here, and mine near it, between papa and Mrs.
Bretton: I must hand his tea."
She took her own seat, and beckoned with her hand to her father.
"Be near me, as if we were at home, papa."
And again, as she intercepted his cup in passing, and would stir the sugar, and put in the cream herself, "I always did it for you at home; papa: nobody could do it as well, not even your own self."
Throughout the meal she continued her attentions: rather absurd they were. The sugar-tongs were too wide for one of her hands, and she had to use both in wielding them; the weight of the silver cream-ewer, the bread-and-butter plates, the very cup and saucer, tasked her insufficient strength and dexterity; but she would lift this, hand that, and luckily contrived through it all to break nothing. Candidly speaking, I thought her a little busy-body; but her father, blind like other parents, seemed perfectly content to let her wait on him, and even wonderfully soothed by her offices.
"She is my comfort!" he could not help saying to Mrs. Bretton. That lady had her own "comfort" and nonpareil on a much larger scale, and, for the moment, absent; so she sympathised with his foible.
This second "comfort" came on the stage in the course of the evening. I knew this day had been fixed for his return, and was aware that Mrs. Bretton had been expecting him through all its hours. We were seated round the fire, after tea, when Graham joined our circle: I should rather say, broke it up—for, of course, his arrival made a bustle; and then, as Mr. Graham was fasting, there was refreshment to be provided. He and Mr. Home met as old acquaintance; of the little girl he took
no notice for a time.
His meal over, and numerous questions from his mother answered, he turned from the table to the hearth. Opposite where he had placed himself was seated Mr. Home, and at his elbow, the child. When I say child I use an inappropriate and undescriptive term—a term suggesting any picture rather than that of the demure little person in a mourning frock and white chemisette, that might just have fitted a good-sized doll—perched now on a high chair beside a stand, whereon was her toy work-box of white varnished wood, and holding in her hands a shred of a handkerchief, which she was professing to hem, and at which she bored perseveringly with a needle, that in her fingers seemed almost a skewer, pricking herself ever and anon, marking the cambric with a track of minute red dots; occasionally starting when the perverse weapon—swerving from her control—inflicted a deeper stab than usual; but still silent, diligent, absorbed, womanly.
Graham was at that time a handsome, faithless-looking youth of sixteen. I say faithless-looking, not because he was really of a very perfidious disposition, but because the epithet strikes me as proper to describe the fair, Celtic (not Saxon) character of his good looks; his waved light auburn hair, his supple symmetry, his smile frequent, and destitute neither of fascination nor of subtlety (in no bad sense). A spoiled, whimsical boy he was in those days.
"Mother," he said, after eyeing the little figure before him in silence for some time, and when the temporary absence of Mr. Home from the room relieved him from the half-laughing bashfulness, which was all he knew of timidity—-"Mother, I see a young lady in the present society to whom I have not been introduced."
"Mr. Home's little girl, I suppose you mean," said his mother.
"Indeed, ma'am," replied her son, "I consider your expression of the least ceremonious: Miss Home I should certainly have said, in venturing to speak of the gentlewoman to whom I allude."
"Now, Graham, I will not have that child teased. Don't flatter yourself that I shall suffer you to make her your butt."
"Miss Home," pursued Graham, undeterred by his mother's remonstrance, "might I have the honour to introduce myself, since no one else seems willing to render you and me that service? Your slave, John Graham Bretton."
She looked at him; he rose and bowed quite gravely. She deliberately put down thimble, scissors, work; descended with precaution from her perch, and curtsying with unspeakable seriousness, said, "How do you do?"
"I have the honour to be in fair health, only in some measure fatigued with a hurried journey. I hope, ma'am, I see you well?"
"Tor-rer-ably well," was the ambitious reply of the little woman and she now essayed to regain her former elevation, but finding this could not be done without some climbing and straining—a sacrifice of decorum not to be thought of—and being utterly disdainful of aid in the presence of a strange young gentleman, she relinquished the high chair for a low stool: towards that low stool
Graham drew in his chair.
"I hope, ma'am, the present residence, my mother's house, appears to you a convenient place of abode?"
"Not par-tic-er-er-ly; I want to go home."
"A natural and laudable desire, ma'am; but one which, notwithstanding,
I shall do my best to oppose. I reckon on being able to get out of you
a little of that precious commodity called amusement, which mamma and
Mistress Snowe there fail to yield me."
"I shall have to go with papa soon: I shall not stay long at your mother's."
"Yes, yes; you will stay with me, I am sure. I have a pony on which you shall ride, and no end of books with pictures to show you."
"Are you going to live here now?"
"I am. Does that please you? Do you like me?"
"No."
"Why?"
"I think you queer."
"My face, ma'am?"
"Your face and all about you: You have long red hair."
"Auburn hair, if you please: mamma, calls it auburn, or golden, and so do all her friends. But even with my 'long red hair'" (and he waved his mane with a sort of triumph—tawny he himself well knew that it was, and he was proud of the leonine hue), "I cannot possibly be queerer than is your ladyship."
"You call me queer?"
"Certainly."
(After a pause), "I think I shall go to bed."
"A little thing like you ought to have been in bed many hours since; but you probably sat up in the expectation of seeing me?"
"No, indeed."
"You certainly wished to enjoy the pleasure of my society. You knew I was coming home, and would wait to have a look at me."
"I sat up for papa, and not for you."
"Very good, Miss Home. I am going to be a favourite: preferred before papa soon, I daresay."
She wished Mrs. Bretton and myself good-night; she seemed hesitating whether Graham's deserts entitled him to the same attention, when he caught her up with one hand, and with that one hand held her poised aloft above his head. She saw herself thus lifted up on high, in the glass over the fireplace. The suddenness, the freedom, the disrespect of the action were too much.
"For shame, Mr. Graham!" was her indignant cry, "put me down!"—and when again on her feet, "I wonder what you would think of me if I were to treat you in that way, lifting you with my hand" (raising that mighty member) "as Warren lifts the little cat."
So saying, she departed.
Strange
By Alexandra H. Rodrigues and Jenny Mc Cain
Rodrigo adjusted his faux leather and cotton doublet. It came together in such a way that it actually made the fit and the wearer look and feel like a real noble. “Dressed for success,” he crowed to himself while gleefully laughing in fits of delight over the evening’s coming attractions. Rodrigo and his lady friend, Esmeralda, were headed to the Red Dragon’s Annual LARP Festival which was being held in the county’s old fairgrounds. The LARP, also known as a Live Action Role Play Fest, had become his one true passion. Where else could a lawyer become a king’s jester and a secretary becomes the queen’s lady in waiting. The LARP was a great equalizer. A place where dreamers, unemployed actors and gamer dorks could spend their days traipsing around in medieval dress and weaponry, shooting imaginary lightning bolts at each other.
It was more than that for Rodrigo. For the first time ever, he fit in. He was no longer labeled the geek. Most attendees were way beyond geek, traversing all the way to extreme dweeb and nerd. Geeks were considered a bit odd and peculiar, and usually known to be of above average intelligence. Being a dweeb took one to a whole new level of lameness in the High School hierarchy. Usually ridiculed, dweebs and nerds were almost always boringly studious individuals with thick black wire-rimmed glasses and a penchant for being a single-minded expert in some technical or scientific field.
Previous social status mattered little at LARP. Rodrigo was looking forward to a night of merriment with Esmeralda and his new role-playing buddies. His friend Rubin had forewarned him of a surprise that the King’s Court planned to unveil at the end of the night’s festivities.
“Jennita, is that you?” Rodrigo’s date heard a voice behind her say. It was a voice she knew too well. The person connected to that voice was the last she wanted to face today or any day for that matter. She did not turn around and was grateful that they were just passing a lady’s room at that same moment. She tore herself out of the possessive grip Rodrigo had placed around her shoulder.
“I’ll be right back,” she shouted and disappeared behind the door.
“I hope Esmeralda does not have a weak bladder; that could become annoying,” he thought. Only a few minutes earlier she had gone to the bathroom at the diner, where they had shared a coffee.
He saw a guy, dressed like Hercules, with a figure which made the hero pride, shaking his head, hurry and get lost in the crowd. I wonder where that Jennita is, that this guy had called, Rodrigo pondered. He suddenly had become curious as there was no other woman in close vicinity.
Esmeralda, alias Jennita, was standing inside the bathroom She was trembling. Robert, the man who had called her had been her lover. He had made her pregnant. He had also made her to agree to an abortion and given her ample money to find somebody to do the procedure. She however had not even looked for an abortionist but had decided that she would carry the child and possibly give it up for adoption in the end. Quickly she had left town, forwarding address unknown.
Four months down the road she had a miscarriage. Now Robert would never find out but still she could not go back to him as she had no explanation why she was avoiding him. She had disappeared without telling h