You’ll Smell Me Coming

The only friend I have, Jasper Millseed used to ask me all the damn time how I could stand it.

“How can you work in that stench? The fucking pain and suffering of those bastards K-Rock- how can you see that shit all day, every day?” He would ask.

Now Jasper’s about as bright as a glow stick running outa juice and he don’t smell all that good himself. Not that regular bathing is a real priority for most of the people living in this shit storm of peeling paint and crack heads they call “Low Income Housing” but more often than not Jasper smelt like open ass in the sun. Why he thought a few dozen burn victims would be that offensive I have no idea.

He was my boy though; helped me out with a ride and he’d listen to my shit from time to time and he kept his mouth shut. So one day I took him with me. Thought maybe it would interesting for him or something. So I picked him up on the corner at eight a.m. sharp and off we went to the hospital.

He lasted all of an hour. It was a bad day though, worst than most. A three alarm had went down that night and we had 4 brand new “crispers” on the ward floor. That’s what we called the really bad ones; the ones that were at least 60 percent third degree fried up on their bodies and had maybe 20 percent chance or so of lasting the next few days. We couldn’t really do anything for them the first day. The doc’s and nurses of course would keep them off by themselves, monitor their little bleeps and drips on the machines and of course keep them as morphed up as possible so they don’t go crazy with the pain. At least when they’re fresh like that they’re on ventilators so it keeps the screaming down.

But the cleaners like me couldn’t do shit with them yet so I was working on Mrs. Langer in room three. I was changing her dressings, going as easy as I could too and talking to her about random things; her little daughters school and how pretty her little girl was, how much I liked Pecan pie (Mrs. Langer liked baking), how she’d be as good as new before she knew it. Shit like that. I didn’t want to hurt her but it’s impossible not to. Her pus filled burnt skin would come peeling off right with those old bandages and whoosh! The stink came off with it.

The smell of decay and re-growth at the same time, the stench of, well of I don’t know what, I ain’t no writer but I guess the stench of something that’ll never be right again. No matter how bad you want it.

Now it doesn’t even register with me of course but Jasper starts gagging and coughing as he stood next to me in the scrubs I had gotten from Nurse Fowler that morning and then poor Mrs. Langer crying slowly and silently through closed eyes. It wasn’t from the pain either, that she was used to.

I put one hand on her forehead and whispered something nice in her ear and got up and pulled that dumb fuck outta that room by his arm.

“What the hell is wrong with you.” I said low as I pulled him down the cold white hall.

“Jesus K- I… I didn’t know it was gonna stink like that!”

I wanted to knock his block off but then I heard nurse Fowler say behind me.

“Kevin, what is the problem? Mrs. Langer is crying and unattended… and, her injuries are not properly cared for.”

Now I was really pissed. I liked Nurse Fowler. She’s the only one that worked in this whole hospital I did like. She smelled like peaches and always said good morning and good night and she’d let me, against normal rules and all, bring this dumb fuck of a friend I have into the ward with me. I’d told her he was my younger cousin and he was doing a school paper on burn victims.

“I’m sorry ma’am,” I said with eyes burning a hole in Jaspers face, “my cousin was having…trouble in the room and I didn’t want to upset the patient.”

“Well I’m sorry Kevin, but the patient is upset and your cousin I think just needs to go and get his information from the library like everyone else.” She looked at Jasper then and said, “Young man, if you have any specific questions you can call me here at the hospital and I’ll answer them for you. But I’m sorry you need to go so your cousin can perform his duties correctly… these are people who need specific attention.”

Jasper mumbled some half ass apology and I didn’t even watch him walk away, I just hollered after him to return the scrubs to the nurses’ station before he left.

“Kevin, please get back to Mrs. Langer right now.” She looked at me kindly on account of she liked me pretty well. “I should not have allowed your cousin in here.” She added,

“This isn’t a place for the unfamiliar…you have potential, please don’t put me in an awkward position again.”

Then she was gone in a starched white wind and I went back to room three feeling like shit. That’s another reason I liked Nurse Fowler; she was always telling me I had potential. She was wrong of course, dead wrong but it’s still nice to hear once in awhile.

I went back and finished cleaning Mrs. Langer, put new dressings and all on, and said she would be ok. They were doing her first “debriding” that afternoon- which is a technical term they use around here- but sounds to me about as pleasant as slowly getting turned inside out. Then she was getting the first round of grafts started, mostly from cadavers, the following day. She was freaking out in the quiet way that she did and spending a few extra minutes with her wouldn’t kill me. So I did and by the time I brought her back to her bed I didn’t feel so pissed off at Jasper anymore.

He was my boy after all, only one I had and knew shit about me, shit I’d never told anyone else; unless I had to.

The smell and the screaming patients and all the gross wiping and wrapping didn’t bother me and he knew that, he even thought he knew why but he didn’t. I’d never gotten used to the smell, never had to, it’s been with me for along while now. It’s been on my skin and in my nose ever since I sat wrapped in that blanket staring at the house shooting flames and sparks into the night with the scent of my parents, charred and dead, all around me as the paramedics brought me water and the police asked how I got out of that inferno without a scratch. Dumb fuckers never could figure it out. It’s part of me. Like the stink of a dead tooth rotting away in your mouth. Like the smell of dirt on a farmer even after he takes a shower and puts on fresh clothes.

That’s how my dad had smelled. He always smelled like dirt. I’d smell it when he came home from the fields and listen for the way he closed the door, trying to figure if he was pissed or just tired. I’d smell it while we all sat in fearful silence at the dinner table and I’d smell it when he beat my ass.

I was thinking about this when I went to the laundry to get some clean sheets and gown for Mr. Blaylock. He needed a sponge bath, new wraps, bedding- the full treatment- and when I was gathering up the linens I started thinking about my mom. God damn bleach always did that. She never smelled like dirt, just bleach. That shit’ll clean just about anything, get the dirt out like it was never even there. Smells like nothing I guess. I’d smell it on her as she did the dishes, and I’d smell it on her after she came home from bingo when she’d stumble in the door, dress and hair all fucked up and reckless. I’d smell it on her when she’d holler from the kitchen all soft and useless, “Jim…Jim… please, that’s enough. You’re going to hurt him.”

We all have a smell I guess. Mine happens to be something a lot of people can’t manage and after I’d finished up with Mr. Blaylock I stopped by Mrs. Langer’s bed to say goodnight. I was still feeling shitty about before. I just stuck my head in real quick and said goodnight and good luck tomorrow and she blinked real slow, twice like we had talked about, so I knew she was feeling better. Then I dumped my scrubs off at the nurses station, got me one final smell of peaches from nurse Fowler as she filled out charts- she said goodnight- I said goodnight- and I walked out through the schwoosh of the hospital doors with the thought maybe me and Jasper could go out and see what kind of trouble we could get into.

Patty Francis Support day!!

Hello Friends and Fellow Artists,

Today’s blog is special and has one purpose–to help Patry Francis. On 1/29, myself and several hundred writers will be doing what we can to aid in selling and promoting her book The Liar’s Diary.

We have agreed to help because as we do this (and beyond 1/29), Patry will be battling cancer.

Normally when an author has done the long hard work of getting an agent, getting a publisher, waiting for that lovely moment when the edits are done and when a book comes out in a big, splashy way, he or she would be ecstatic about going on book tour and enjoying the presence of fans and book-buyers at readings.

This is that moment for Patry, but she cannot do such a tour–so when Susan Henderson, general goddess of LitPark, came up with this idea about how we writers could help Patry, I thought this was a wonderful idea.

I also enjoyed what Patry’s blog had to say about finding community with other artists and the relevance we have in each other’s life:

“…But in spite of my isolation, through the internet, I now have what writers had to move to Paris to find in the twenties, or enter a costly MFA program in the nineties to encounter–friends! Real ones! In fact, I’d be willing to bet this solitary writer now has more friends than Hemingway did! A whole community of writers and bloggers who believe that stories can change the world, a community who believe that the fate of fictional characters, or the meticulous or messy arrangement of words and motion, and feeling into a poem or an essay is worth whatever sacrifice it takes.”

Well, I believe that, too, Patry. I believe in literature. I believe in supporting other writers.

I believe you will enjoy your next book tour far more–because I believe you will survive this cancer– and tomorrow at 0-dark-thirty, when I get up, I will go and buy your book.

Anyone else who would like to help Patry in their blogs, please feel free to copy and past any of this text. And hey, all you readers out there–this book looks delicious.

“The Liar’s Diary.”

In my way of thinking, buying it is like doing an act from kindness that also happens to be its own magnificent reward.

Much love to all,

H

P.S. Courtesy of LitPark–here is some amazing stuff that promotes the book. Watch and listen.

“Whether you like text, audio, or video, I have a taste of the book for you. Let’s start with an audio clip of THE LIAR’S DIARY. This audio clip comes courtesy of Eileen Hutton at Brilliance Audio.

This video for THE LIAR’S DIARY was created by Sheila Clover English, C.E.O. of Circle of Seven Productions, who was moved by Patry’s story and volunteered her lightning-speed creativity!

Here are the publisher’s words:

Answering the question of what is more powerful—family or friendship? this debut novel unforgettably shows how far one woman would go to protect either.

They couldn’t be more different, but they form a friendship that will alter both their fates. When Ali Mather blows into town, breaking all the rules and breaking hearts (despite the fact that she is pushing forty), she also makes a mark on an unlikely family. Almost against her will, Jeanne Cross feels drawn to this strangely vibrant woman, a fascination that begins to infect Jeanne’s “perfect” husband as well as their teenaged son.

At the heart of the friendship between Ali and Jeanne are deep-seated emotional needs, vulnerabilities they have each been recording in their diaries. Ali also senses another kind of vulnerability; she believes someone has been entering her house when she is not at home—and not with the usual intentions. What this burglar wants is nothing less than a piece of Ali’s soul.

When a murderer strikes and Jeanne’s son is arrested, we learn that the key to the crime lies in the diaries of two very different women . . . but only one of them is telling the truth. A chilling tour of troubled minds, The Liar’s Diary signals the launch of an immensely talented new novelist who knows just how to keep her readers guessing.

And now, here are Patry’s words, which I lifted off her blog: “Though my novel deals with murder, betrayal, and the even more lethal crimes of the heart, the real subjects of THE LIAR’S DIARY are music, love, friendship, self-sacrifice and courage. The darkness is only there for contrast; it’s only there to make us realize how bright the light can be. I’m sure that most writers whose work does not flinch from the exploration of evil feel the same.”

Ready to buy the book? Why not buy one for yourself and one for a friend? And if you like it, tell people!

You can purchase THE LIAR’S DIARY at Amazon, Barnes & Noble.., and Powell’s. You can also buy directly from Penguin to save 15%.. (after you add the book to your cart, just enter the word PATRY in the coupon code field and click ‘update cart’ to activate the discount).”

Finding Religion

You would think someone in the situation Jenkins finds himself that he would go out and find himself some sort of religion. In my experience, that is what people do when they are wrapped in the clutches of peril or disaster. They call out to God as their head is pressed against the cold porcelain, their arms wrapped around the toilet. They murmur silent promises that a lifelong pursuit of kindness and warmth is forthcoming if ONLY the man in the blue uniform making them walk the straight line under flashing lights would simply go away. The groan in agony “God, oh God, if only you will make him/her come back to me again… I will never stray!”

Of course you know what I am saying. The desperately uttered promises of change thrown at the wall of shame, pain or catastrophe that faces all people so often in their lives; it’s human nature after all. And for what? Silly really when you think about it. If calamity comes anyway the deal is off and God is blamed, if it is averted, the relief is so great the promise is forgotten.

So you would imagine, with nothing in life to really call his own and while wandering through the lamp lit night of the streets that were his home that he might call out once, maybe twice, for the help of infinite wisdom; most would, and they wouldn’t mean a bit of it but Jenkins- well Jenkins- in his faded army coat and tattered jeans really did not think that was necessary. It was not that Jenkins hated God. He simply did not really think about Him.

Jenkins was unusual, even by homeless standards. He had a watch that worked as time was important to him. He bathed daily, as best he could, instead of only when completely necessary; when he simply couldn’t stand the stink of himself any longer. He had made some friends among the local restaurants and he ate regular meals. You could see him standing in the back alleys in the morning mist eating a plate of food as a man or women in white aprons stood beside him talking softly. They would laugh together as Jenkins ate with without hurry.

Oh, he would of course by necessity participate in the standard homeless traditions. You would see him, this tall lean black man, with bald head and squinty eyes, walking the back alleys finding items of value thrown out in the dumpsters. He was particular though and he would gather them up in his cart and weave his way through the alley’s and streets to Lester’s Second Hand Store. He would unload the lamps and fans, clothing and even the books, which he hated to give up but would. Then the transaction would be made. It was a wonderful deal for Mr. Lester as he paid almost nothing for the items but almost nothing to Jenkins was a long stretch better than absolutely nothing. It meant to Jenkins he would never have to do the thing he could never do. The thought of pandering made him nauseous, he had vowed to himself never to be in that place and I would see him do this and it made me happy, proud almost like a father.

Then Jenkins would check his watch, and make his way to church. It opened at eleven am every day. Jenkins walked through the freshly swept streets with his hands in his pockets and would pass the Lutherans first, and then he strolled on by the Methodists, never raising his gaze in curiosity. Next were the Protestants. Then he would pass the massive steeple of the Catholics, their towering cathedral laying a shadow across the sidewalk. Finally he would turn the corner at 5th and slowly walk the last two blocks, then go up the small flight of steps, hitting each one, and enter the local library.

It was warm and bright and silent and he was never bothered. They all knew him by now, new his name was Jenkins and maybe if he would have been different they would at some point have to have done something about it. But the way he scanned the aisles, searching for something until one caught his eye was genuine. The way he would sit in silent content with eyes moving back and forth along the pages and the small expressions of joy, sadness, wonder and concern was true. You cannot loiter while reading. So they let him be. Sometimes one of the librarians would bring him a Styrofoam cup of hot coffee; he would accept it with a smile of thanks and go back to whichever selection laid before him.

There was a time some months before where an arrogant child of high school age was arguing loudly with one of the desk attendants about an overdue fine he had. He could not pay it he said, although he could. He needed this book for school he also said, which he did not. Finally after several minutes Jenkins rose up from his table, taking his current book with him and walked up the boy. Jenkins at him for a moment and then placing the book down on the counter brought his single index finger up to his mouth with firmness, with concern. Jenkins then lowered his hand from his mouth slowly and put it in the long side pocket of his army jacket. He brought it out with ten dollars in single bills and placed them on the counter while the attendant and arrogant boy started at him with wide eyes.

Maybe he smiled, maybe he didn’t but I remember him thinking how funny he thought the whole affair was. He gathered up his book from the counter and returned to his seat, sat down and took a sip of coffee and slowly opened the book to where he had left off.

Water, Women and Wine

“Billy…did you finish your homework yet?” I heard mom calling from inside the charred stink of the kitchen. The whole house still reeked from whatever she tried to cook for dinner and I was sitting on the couch, eating my P&J sandwich trying to watch the last few minutes of the Facts of Life. Trudy was whining again about how hard it is being a fat girl, mom had been crying, again, and I just wanted to be left in peace.

I continued staring at the television screen, trying to catch what Tootie was explaining through tear filled eyes to a patiently listening Mrs. Garrett, and after glancing only briefly at my unopened book bag said, “yeah.”

“It’s late, please go down and get your father.” She pleaded and I thought, for fucks sake, I’ve had a bad day; a really, really bad day and now, for shit’s and giggles, I have to trudge down there and pull him out of the damn pub. This is my life, I thought. Living in this stinking little island turd of a town, wondering who would have the pleasure of kicking my ass at school tomorrow, eating peanut butter and jelly on half stale bread while my mother torches dinner after dinner and the fucking frosting; the god damn cherry on top is prying my drunk ass old man from the third leg of his bar throne five nights a week.

I stood up, walked over to the television that had been discontinued after Nixon resigned and shut it off. Walking through the land mines of second hand toys my little brother Auggie was still too young to know were defective I wondered if in another life, I had killed a king or pillaged a village or something, something unforgivable, to deserve the abyss of crap I wallowed in now. I opened the door to the paint cracking, roof leaking, dilapidated beach bungalow my parents struggled daily to keep from the relentlessly reaching hands of the bank and said back over my shoulder without thinking, “Yeah Ma, I’ll go get pop; I’ll be quick about it to, I know Norman Rockwell’s coming over any minute for the family portrait.”

The door shut behind me and I stood out on the porch, the sticky Florida evening all round me and I suddenly felt smaller than the damn Cicadas chirping away in the humid gloaming. Fucks sake, I thought-why do I do that shit? My father does that shit- and I ain’t him. I should have gone back in. I should have; but I didn’t. I turned around and saw her standing in that smoke filled kitchen and you know what she was doing? She was scraping out that roasting pan. She was scraping away at the charred remains of whatever hell had been in there; chicken or tuna casserole or god knows what just so she could most likely as not, burn up something as bad or worse tomorrow. She wasn’t crying either. Ma usually only cries when she has to start thinking of things as they are but when she’s busy burning food and then cleaning it up she doesn’t have to think about any of that. Maybe that’s why she burns stuff. So she can stand there cleaning up the wreckage of it just to take her mind off the ruins of her own life.

And then I saw she had Auggie up in his little kid seat. All strapped in like a baby astronaut and he was eating something. I hope it wasn’t anything out of that pot but he was eating something and my mom was talking to him. Course he wasn’t talking back, being a year and some change old and all but she was kinda just talking things to him like he could answer, like he understood or something. Who knows what she was saying because even poor folks like us have A/C in Florida so the windows were closed. Maybe she was telling him what a good little baby boy he was- maybe she was telling him who things were all right, or that good things happen, eventually to good people- maybe she was telling him what an asshole he had for a big brother.

Maybe she was saying out loud or thinking inside what my pop always said,

“Two assholes don’t make a right, just make more shit.” Yeah, I know. He’s the family philosopher.

I just couldn’t go back in after that and so I took my butt down the gravely, littered road that led out from our stretch of town. The “Redneck Riviera” was what most of those that didn’t actually live in it called it, hell; most of the folks that lived in it called it that. Said it with some kinda warped sense of pride, like a hallucination almost; that maybe sticking a elegant word to it made the rusted hunks of cars on blocks in their yards a gurgling fountain, or statue of David, instead of a useless piece of shit. They could sit around in their wife beaters drinking and look upon their battered up old skiffs half waiting on engines or parts of engines and the other half waiting on a storm sinking for the insurance claim as if they was fine gondolas and they were just passing the day, drinking wine, and waiting for their gondolier to show up.

Shit man, the “Redneck Riviera” I thought to myself as I slowly made my way down to the marina where pop would be holding court amongst his legions of devoted disciples, passing flocks of plastic pink flamingos and confederate flag flapping flagpoles… yeah, it was kinda funny.

I sure wasn’t in any kind of rush to get down to the bar, I mean it was going to be a task either way peeling pop off that stool and usually he was just a little less stuck to it the more he got in him so time wasn’t really of the essence. Besides, it was still early enough where some of the kids from school might be out and around; I was absolutely in no rush to be running into any of them so I scooped one of the beers I had grabbed from the fridge earlier out of my “European” camouflage, deep pocketed shorts and made my way down to Wally’s pond. One good thing about having a drunk for a pop is this; they can’t count so good. Hell I could’ve taken a twelve pack and he’d just assume he drank them all. It wasn’t so much cold anymore since I had started to get the feeling I might be put on guide duty earlier and had been lugging them around for a few hours; but it was cold enough, and it was good.

Wally’s pond was something of an institution round the ole Riviera; Wally was a gator, damn big son of a bitch too; and his pond was a swampy bit of nothing, but it was his home. I’d come down here every now and then; I’d steal some chicken or fish out of the house before ma could scorch it all up and feed it to old Wally. Tonight though I just felt like going down there to say hello and he was there all right, I stood there on the moonlit bank and he came up from the gloom twenty yards away or so, his little lizard eyes staring at me from just above the surface of the water. We just kinda looked at each other for a bit and I started wondering what it was like for him. He was all alone. No other gators in that pond to keep him company, none anyone’s ever seen before anyway, he must get lonely, just swimming around, looking for food or waiting for hand outs and basking in the hot sun all by himself. I was starting to feel bad for him and then the water gurgled some and in a ripple of water he was gone.

I started making my way down to the marina after that; it’d most likely been long enough for pop to expound on whatever he needed to that evening and getting him up and home shouldn’t be much trouble. Not any more trouble than usual in any event. I was still thinking about Wally, and about my mom and dad, and about me when I turned the corner from Cypress onto main where the marina was when I ran smack into the balls of it. Marty Childress, Alias Turner and about 4 of their storm troopers where up against one of the shop walls, Sandy’s Sea Shells I think, smoking cigarettes and waiting for nothing but trouble to come by.

“Fuck.” I said under my breath, my first instinct to turn on a dime and head back the other way; it was too late though, they had seen me and the jeering, wormy little voices started coming at me almost immediately.

“Hey!” Marty started up, “It’s Billy Boner! Billy the Backdoor Kid; hey Billy, Billy Boner… you come looking for a hand job or somthin? Didn’t get your rocks off in the shower enough you homo?”

For fucks sake I thought, keeping my head down, not looking at these morons and just continued walking, not too fast, but as quickly as I could towards the lights of the pub a block away that somehow now looked as inviting and safe as the lights of my house had once been.

?Yeah->

“Ha Ha, little homo gets his jollies off watching real men in the shower.” One of the storm troopers spat out as they formed a circle around me in the dark, empty street.

I looked up thinking fuck it, wouldn’t be the first time, wouldn’t be the last so might as well get on with it and said, “I’m impressed, you fellas are a bunch of real live god damn scholars ain’t ya?” I continued looking Marty right in the eye, “If you want to know the truth, I didn’t even see ya’all in there, my shit got straight as a stovepipe thinking about Marty’s girl Angie slobbin up and down my Johnson…like she did the other night.”

Well it doesn’t take a genius to know what was gonna happen after telling this group of misfits I had the mouth of their leaders girl wrapped around my ho-ho recently, even if it wasn’t a bit of truth to it, and they started coming for me immediately.

“Hey boys, what’s shakin besides that bunch of peas rattling around in those melons of yours?”

We’d all been so busy slinging insult and bravado we hadn’t even heard him coming but there he was, sitting perched on a mailbox, feet dangling, smoking a cigarette and looking at the bunch of us like we were a bunch of stray dogs, wet from a storm.

“Got nothing to do with you Matty, Alias said with more than a little worry.

“Yeah, we’re just fixin to show Billy Boner what happens to faggots who stare in the locker room.” Marty said.

Matty was a year ahead of all of us in school and years older in every other way. He’d never backed away from anything, man, women or child as far as I knew. Hell, I’d heard he had beat the crap outta fifteen tourist kids that was pickin on some Jamaican boy a few years back; whooped every last one of them and sent them cryin to their rich daddies. I was pretty happy to see him I’ll tell you that and although I couldn’t tell if it was gonna change anything regarding the imminent brawl at least I wouldn’t get every bone in my face smashed in.

“I heard about that Childress,” Matty said smirking as he flung his smoke and hopped down from the mailbox. “I’ll tell you though, if I’d seen that skinny white girlie butt of yours, toweling off and all; I figure I’d get a bit exited myself.” He walked right up into the middle of them all as he said it, looking at each of them with an amused grin on his face. Matty wasn’t really that much bigger than any of us, maybe an inch and a few pounds heavier but he carried a hundred stories of mean behind him; and that, made him seem gigantic.

He just stood in the middle of us all, looked old Marty shit-head right in the eye and said, “So seeing as that’s the case, I mean if I was there I suppose I would’ve been staring at you to…well, I figure that means you boys are going to have to show me what happens to faggots also.”

Well, I ain’t never heard a louder bunch of thinking as I did coming out of all those boys heads. Matty Skyles wasn’t any kind of a faggot, you only had to know of him to know that was fact; but if he was willing to insinuate that he was, well, it was going to be a fight that these knuckleheads were going to have to think more than twice about getting into.

They didn’t even say anything, didn’t need to really; Marty just gave me a look that told me to grow eyes in the back of my head, turned around and walked away kicking rocks in disgust and his little boy scout troop just turned and followed, one by one.

“And Childress!” Matty hollered after them, “if I hear you decide to go teaching lessons another day, and I will hear, I’ll be taking that as a personal insult and I will kick your personal ass.”

Matty walked up beside me and we watched them all walk away. My blood stopped pumping a mile a minute and I couldn’t believe what had just happened.

“Look Matty, thanks,” I started to say, “I ain’t like that, I was just minding my own business today, wasn’t looking at nothing and it just kinda happ..”

“Hey, it isn’t really anything I care to be discussing with you to be honest.” He said. “Go get your pop out of that bar; I hear he’s getting pretty loaded. I heard he lost his sword boat. Bad deal, getting harder and harder to make a living out on that water; he won’t be the last.”

He turned then and was walking away from me, kind of just strolling with his hands in his pocket.

“And just call me poop, my friend’s call me poop.” He hadn’t even turned around when he said it.

I started making my way down the street and the heavy water smells of fish, fuel and the brine of the ocean was getting heavier, pouring into my nose like some rancid road-kill carcass. I hated the water. I hated being surrounded by it in this god-forsaken island town; hated how small and alone it made me feel and I hated that in the whole big god damn ocean that water couldn’t let my pop find enough fish to keep his boat. That it would let him become the worst kind of drunk; a dreamer without hope. I saw the pub lights as I walked up to the door and they didn’t seem friendly and comforting now, that’s for sure. And I thought as I walked in and smelled the stale beer, peanuts and stink of the marina that nothing in this whole damn world made sense.

Peacocks Like Children Screaming

Donnie Durstin was a self-aware man. Everyone in the whole lazy town of Mezoolah knew it and was always saying things like, “That Donnie Durstin, he knows what he loves and why he loves it.” Or “Ole Donnie Durstin knows what’s what,” Which among the earth salting folks in Mezoolah was high praise indeed. And they were right. Donnie did know what he loved and why and he knew what, was what. So when Donnie came thundering down dusty route 47 in that dented up old blue Ford and drove right down Main Street with the truck bed loaded up with bird cages the good people of Mezoolah figured there must be a reasonable reason for it.
And they were right, there was. What they didn’t know is that besides knowing the what and why’s of his loves and knowing the what’s of what Donnie Durstin knew a few other things as well.

He knew for instance, how to talk to the wind. He could smell the coming storm hours before the fall. He could tell you the sound of one hand clapping and he could recall with clarity every one of his fourteen lives. Having only been on the path in a serious way for the last 11 of those lives he was also prone to nostalgia so when he’d seen the add in the Pickney Journal last week stating Nate Blanton’s peacock farm was closing its unprofitable doors forever Donnie started wandering back to those comfortable days and nights over 10 lives ago. Fragrant warm nights in Sri Lanka filled with the urgent call of the rutting males as they strutted throughout his fathers’ small farm, seeking out mates, tails emblazoned in a staggering array.

He thought back on the fondness of his Lama’s calm voice spooning him his first bits of the truth as it is and explaining patiently the Dharma’s inner voice as the wild childlike screams of the birds sounded in the distance like raindrops. He’d been diligent these last ten lifetimes and knew from the bright whiteness of his own aura and the way the beating pulse of all things flowed so strongly in him now that this was finally his last time of footprints on earth.

“What a better way to end then at the beginning.” He thought with perfectly benign amusement when he saw the advertisement so he fixed up the whole backyard with the birds necessity’s as he knew them, drove on up to Pickney and returned with 30 beautiful pieces of his birth. Later that afternoon he sat in the shaded dewy garden grass with eyes closed and mind open full as the 21 peacocks and seven peahens milled about all around the yard, picking eagerly at the garden bugs in thanks to their newfound home.

His mind eventually let him come back and Donnie used the remaining light of day, as he usually did, to remain in lotus and go back through the fullness of all his lives, marking the growth along the way. Those early lives he remembered with the parents’ chuckle at the insolent child. He laughed at the eagerness for insignificance and he cried at the meanness- the ignorant intolerance- and it made the knowledge now that much sweeter. The road had been long and potholed- but never weary. He lingered longer than usual and enjoyed the birds, and the birds enjoyed him, then he rose up, leaving garden for the warmth of his bed.

The next morning he spent in the vegetable garden, his large six foot frame gently tending the summer lettuce, choosing tomatoes and cucumbers with care as his new friends mingled about silently, asking him funny questions about the day. Donnie’s grin grew warm as his neighbors would pass with curious stares and questioning hello’s. Mezoolan’s were above all things a curious lot, in fact, it’s one of the reason’s Donnie always stayed. Eventually little Lorrie Finley wandered into the yard, a nice green glow around her twelve year old frame, long blond ponytail wrapped in a bright blue ribbon.

“Hiya Mr. Durstin, where’d ya get all them birds?” She asked with eyes bouncing.

“Lorrie, I bought them in Pickney just yesterday, from a man who did not want them any longer.”

“Can I pet them?”

“I wouldn’t just now; the confusion from the trip still remains… tomorrow perhaps.”

A few other friends and neighbors had entered the garden, the unusual sight of 30 peafowl too much for them to bear; greetings were passed and questions were answered while the warm summer sun marked the passing day.

Mr. Meecham, ever the pragmatist wanted to know with mild concern through his aqua blue aura, “Donnie, won’t them birds chase ya? I mean the kids?”

“Only if they have a reason.”

Shirley Buckley, who lived down the street sat down in one of the large garden chairs ensconced in soft lilac light and as three birds pecked silently at the ground around her asked, “How bout the noise? I hear those things scream like crazy?”

“They talk like you and I are talking right now… but only when they have to and they will be quiet for now.”

Soon the garden yard was filled with mingling people and birds, walking the same grass, breathing the same air and Donnie saw all the different colors of light in all of them. Some have many lives yet to go, he would think, while others he could see were very close to his own place and others still, would never truly be born. Slowly, the crowd drifted away in pieces with the fading day’s light and Donnie was along in the garden with his birds.

The birds walked about in their easy fashion, pecking at this and that and Donnie talked to them softly and kindly; assuring them these were good people and they would be happy here. His sadness was brief and then, with lifetimes of knowledge behind him entered the house carrying a large wicker basket filled with the vegetables he had picked throughout the day.

***

The well oiled screen door opened soundlessly late that evening and the hulking man entered with the fearlessness of the insane. His large sunken eyes held the shrieking bloodlust from the night before, he’d cut the newspaper clipping out as carefully as he’d removed that old lady’s shriveled heart just one small state to the north. Donnie lay in bed quietly removed as he watched the man’s shape engulf his bedroom doorway. Finally he thought, finally my walk is over. He noticed the oily black color surrounded the massive shape of the silhouetted man standing before him and felt the lunacy in his heart; he was thinking how many lifetimes this one still had in front of him as the long blade gleamed in the darkness.

Shadows of Truth

“Character is like a tree and reputation like its shadow. The shadow is what we think of it; the tree is the real thing.”

Abraham Lincoln Lincoln’s Own Stories
16th president of US (1809 – 1865)

Matthew, Matty (Poop) Skyles was born in the spring of 1970 in the Little Duck Key hospital, just outside of Marathon Key. I know because I was laying there squealing bloody hell like the newborn I was right there in the same nursery. My name’s Jimmy Scranton and I suppose me and poop have been best friends ever since. Longer than I can remember anyway.

We’re what you call natives around the Keys and the circle of folks that can honestly still say that are getting smaller and smaller each year. We were pretty lucky; Matty and me. We’ve seen the Keys as they were and looked on them with the innocent wild eyes of children in the 70’s and 80’s; when this little turquoise blue, emerald green part of the world really was paradise. Not the paradise I see plastered up on cute little mailbox’s and silly little restaurant’s called “Paradise Grill” or “Little Conch Paradise Smokehouse.” Nope, I’m talking about actual island hoppin, lobster stabbin, snapper catchin and anything else fun you can think of to do on the water in the tropical balm of summer and winter type paradise.

Lemme give you a typical day in an actual paradise growing up here in these warm rich waters. First, it always, and I mean always, had something to do with the big beautiful half Caribbean/half Atlantic/half Gulf of Mexico Ocean we have down here; all littered with uninhabited (then) little cays and sand-spit keys with cool names.

Names like sugarloaf key, Chub Cay, Boot and Big Torch Key, Snipe landing, Sombrero Light and a million others that we would just make the names up as we went along and then forgot them so we could make up another one the next day. It was like being a pirate! We all had little runabout boats growing up and Matty’s dad got him a fine one; nice little 26 ft Grady White and we’d spend all day doing one of three things:

Fish

Go Bugging

Or work the shoals and breaks for bait.

The fishing part was pretty easy. Up at the butt crack a dawn and hustle up some bait; goggle-eye if they were running, mullet in the fall cause they were thick as thieves or sardines if it was in the blast furnace heat of summer. If bait was scarce, as it could get once in awhile back then but happens all the damn time now, we’d simply run around in the boat through the canals until we spotted one of the neighbors out on their dock and holler up if we could grab a few dozen outta their wells if they had cages dropped and full in the water. If you had bait you always shared when asked, course the payment was a few fillets or tuna steaks later in the day from the borrower. After that shits pretty simple. Head offshore and run to the hump or Mann’s Point or any one of several dozen spots and look for birds to show the way to the tuna, or dolphin (Mahi Mahi) and wahoo or if God shined down, a big beautiful marlin to play with for a few hours. Course you don’t keep billfish, that’s just for the sport and if you weren’t really rigged for them they’d break the line pretty quick anyway. So we’d go looking for the fish, catchem up, put em in the box and head on back to the dock for some grillin. Or if the big boys weren’t eating that day, after awhile we’d head into the shallows and rock piles and crush some grouper or yellowtail snapper or mutton’s. Sometimes if we were feeling like being lazy we’d take the electric reels out and just deep drop for the tile fish and red-eye snappers that lurked in those cold deep reefs several hundred feet down. Easy-peezy man. Sounds like a nice day doesn’t it?

Now bugging was only legal a few months out of the year but back then-hell-nobody much cared when you went. All that entails is doing a slow troll at night, big flashlights searching the dark shallow water until their lights would show up like two little teeny diamonds and then someone would jump in head first with his gig stick while somebody else killed the engine (for safety) and you’d just kick on down to the rock the little fucker was hiding under, rope the little bastard with the gig stick and pull em out. Swim on up to the surface, hop aboard and toss that juicy little Florida Lobster right into the bucket with his friends.

Poop and me would do that a lot just by ourselves, sometimes Goose and Billy’d go with, especially when we all got older but the baiting was something only me and him would do.

It was his idea actually. Matty is a thinker if nothing else and he was always industrious. He figured we could make some good money catching bait for all the other fisheads, especially the charter guys who’s income depended on their customers catching fish so when we’d need some cash for gas and later for gas and beer we’d spend the whole damn day working the water with our cast nets,or sabiki rigs if sardines were around, and sell them bad boys all over the islands. Just go from canal to canal, dock to dock and marina to marina pulling bait outa the big fifty gallon live well he had on that Grady and we’d be set for a week or two. Kids can’t really do that now. They’ve got laws, registrations, regulations and all against that kind of thing.

But back than we were something I’ll tell ya. Bunch island boys, lanky and always tan from the sun and salt having times. Ya mon, we sure would have some times. Matty used to call us Renaissance Men on a reign of terror! He’d say it funnier than hell too; “..reeeeign of terror!” was how he’d say it and we’d all start laughing our butts off.

He could be a terror to when he wanted to, when he needed to, and I guess we were all pretty much fearless back then but Matty, that kid had a way of stepping in it all the time.

We came across a bunch of tourist kids one day, they were older; bout six of them, and they was just beatin the crap out of little Johnny Mafood. Johnny was a Jamaican kid, his folks were poor and Johnny was small for his age, plus he talked with that strange Caribbean accent. Easy target for a bunch of morons cause there’s hate everywhere, even in paradise. So we come across this half dozen kids wailing on poor Johnny, calling him all kinds of stupid ass names and Matty didn’t even hesitate. Before I knew it he launched himself into that scrum and started hitting anything that wasn’t black and dreadlocked. I was kinda committed after that and every last one of them tasted our knuckles before it was through. We both took a pounding but poop got the worst of it. Pretty bad actually; broken nose, busted his right hand, but after awhile those kids lit outta there with their tails between their legs. Problem was a few of them tourist kids had some pretty rich parents and word gets out pretty quick in these parts. People, other locals, started saying “troublemaker” and “white trash” (Matty’s folks lived in a trailer out by sugarloaf) in the same breath as Matty. Those kids told their folks Matty Skyles jumped em and started the whole fiasco; didn’t seem to matter the truth was he was just helping out a kid in a six to one fight.

Then there was the time me and Matty, Maggie Collins and Isie Hollis were all hanging out at Isie’s house. We’d had some beers and were sitting on the dock out back, watching the southern moon sprawled out on that canal water and things got the way things get when hormones are moving through you like the Gulf Stream. Matty and Isie started mashing and after awhile me and Maggs left to, well to kinda go find our own little spot to do the same thing. Isie’s dad, Carl Hollis came home and discovered Matty’s tongue wrapped around his little girls’ tonsils and about blue a fucking blood vessel! Ole Carl Hollis owned a whole lotta property around the islands at that time and he cast a pretty large shadow; over the town and in his own family and before you could say boo all of a sudden Matty Skyles is some sort of lurking pervert; ready to pounce on young girls virtue at a moments notice. I know Isie tried to stand up but once people like Carl Hollis started saying things is like this, in parts like these, there isn’t a lot you can do about it. Poor girl never stood a chance.

It got worse to as we got older. That’s when the snowbirds really started rolling in like an avalanche of god damn Hawaiian shirts and socks with sandals. I blame it on Jimmy Buffet and his freakin cheeseburgers in Paradise.(But that’s another story.) They started pouring down from New York and Philly, Chicago and Atlanta looking for their little slice of paradise. We both got jobs working the charter boats so not only would we have to rub elbows with all these masses of khaki shorts and sunscreen but we’d have to teach the ignorant bastards how to fish! And if they didn’t catch enough by their asinine calculations they wouldn’t tip!

I mean, we got by, me and poop but it was frustrating; we’re waiting in line for tables at dive’s we used to be able to just wander half drunk into and sit down for a nice grouper sandwich and a beer. And they started staying too. All these people with all this money and not a thread a manners among them. They’d say, “Well shit Gloria, look at that lovely little beachfront there. Perfect place for a nice big condo now is it not?”

Well money rolls I guess don’t it? And it rolled like a rogue wave into these parts; in a few years we had more people down here than we had sand, condo’s throwing up shadows on some of the best tarpon and bait lagoons and shoals we’d spent so many hours on as kids. I guess the whole thing started wearing Matty down. We’d always been drinkers; what in Christ’s name goes better with some nice snapper and lobster than a few dozen cold ones and some rum drinks? Well, he started drinking quite a bit and not just like we’d always done before, with a reason and all but just because I don’t think he had much better to do. Started getting in fights with snowbirds and local’s alike, sometimes about nothing and sometimes about something. Like the time some jerkoff named Goldstein started yammerin about how all these “uneducated, foul mouthed locals couldn’t even manage to do the landscaping correctly” at his brand spanking new slice of blue-haired condo paradise. So Matty said something I’m sure was not very welcoming and they ended up on the floor of the “Prime Catch” bar throwing insult and skin at each other.

Then early last year Matty and Celia Barton managed to get themselves preggers. Now Celia’s a peach but her old man wasn’t all that pleased with his daughter carrying around the seed of what most folks around here consider a cross between the devil’s spawn and James Dean. And I don’t mean the cool James Dean; I mean the one that had no direction, the one that stole women into the night, the one that died because he was stupid.

And that put a lot of pressure on poop. He loves Celia, he loves her crazy and he’s got his pride, like any man has. Well he wasn’t going to be supporting them and their little baby by mating on charter boats, all we’ve both ever done is work and play on the water and the only real paying type jobs around here are construction. And for the love of irony most of the construction round here is being done by one Mr. Carl Hollis so even if Matty had any actual experience at it he’d be shit out of luck.

Celia was working for as long as she could at the Pirates Cove; one of the new restaurants that seem to open up with every wane tide, but with the baby coming she had to cut that out about a month ago so money was getting really, really thin. Matty knew some guys, like we all do, that were running weed up through the straits and down into some of the smaller keys and he got to thinking about how easy that money would be. Me and him both know every back water, every hidden shoal and every unmarked cove from Islamorada to Key West. He knew he could run wide open on that Grady without running lights all night long if he had to. Plus half the damn Coasties know him from still spending three quarters of his time on the water so even if a cutter came up on him he could most likely talk his way out of it. I didn’t like it. I told him I didn’t like it but once an idea pops into his head he’s never been one to back off it until the wheels fall off; good or bad.

Well he ran into the other half of the Coast Guard. They didn’t know him and even if they did, who knows, it probably wouldn’t have mattered. So know Matty’s sitting in the sheriff’s cooler in Marathon, baby on the way and waiting on federal charges to be filed in a little necklace of island paradises where finding a handful of people to say one good thing about him is gonna be a stretch.

Of course, when the time comes, I’ll say all I can good about Matty Skyles. I’ll sing it from the god damn rafters if it’ll do any good; but I know it most likely won’t. What I can’t tell them, what won’t matter one bit are some of things I know about my friend.

Like the time he ran headfirst to defend a little Jamaican kid he barely knew.

Like the time he got called a pervert by some fat ass big shot who was lying through his teeth when he said it.

Like the time we were spear fishing and I got hit by a Barracuda. Stupid thing, me still wearing my watch down there; Cuda ain’t mean but they sure as shit are fast, stupid and have a mouthful of teeth. Ripped my hand to ribbons and we were half a mile offshore with a strong current blowing out. He swam me back, fixed me up as best as he could and carried me on his back two miles to the same hospital in duck key we were born in.

I’d like to tell them about the time he found Larry Peters wallet down on the beach. Had a shitload of cash in it, I mean it was loaded. Matty didn’t even ring the bell; he just dropped that wallet into the mail slot in their door and never touched so much as a dollar of it.

I’d like to tell em about a lot of things regarding my friend. I’ve known him thirty eight years and I’ve never seen him do a mean thing. I’ve seen him do stupid things, lots of them but never a mean thing and very much more often than not somebody had something coming to em and he’d walk away. I’d tell him we’re just two native boys trying to live, trying to make it down here because living anywhere else wouldn’t be thinkable. I’d say that God Damn it, we’re just trying to find our own little piece of paradise.

I guess maybe ole Don Henley was right; you call someplace paradise, kiss it goodbye.

Almost Lovers

A furrowed brow is never good; even more so when held over two steaming plates of linguine and clams but that is where we find them; two people, picking away in silence at plates of pasta and clams with furrowed brows in the candlelight.

They were neither young nor old; he was several years older than she but she had years more experience. She had been broken into pieces of pain by men, and then made whole again by another and she was sad to know now, that it would happen again.

“We need to talk about it.” She said.

“I thought we had.” He replied.

It was the same tone he used with employees, the voice of finality he used in the business of business was the same one he now used in the business of love and the wine he poured out for both of them could just as easily been water flowing from the crystal pitcher he kept in his boardroom.

She looked around the room taking in the things that were his, the things that were hers and the things that were theirs or at least, she had always considered to be theirs, all the while walking back in her mind over the moments that had first brought them together. The whirlwind of exotic parties and country club dances that had made her feel unique and enriched. The endless monologues of pending deals and the magnanimous way he sounded as he spoke of them had made her feel part of them, part of him. It all seemed a caricature to her now.

How does that happen? She thought. How can something so real one moment turn into a cartoon the next?

“I think, you think we talked about it. When all I did was listen to you make sounds actually.” She said. “Which when you look at it, is exactly what I said is the problem.”

Christ what does she want from me? He thought. Why do women think success springs up like magic bean stalks from an eight hour day, 5 days a week? These things… this life is from being there, at the wheel when everyone else was still sleeping, when everyone else had gone home.

“I AM present, I am here but how many pieces do you think I can cut myself up into? How much do you think I have? I am here, and I am present whenever I can be.” The words came from him empty of anger and resentment. The measured, emotionless tone was the only one, of late, he seemed capable of using.

He remembered the first time they had met and wanted to look at her but instead, stabbed a clam with his polished fork from the swirling angel hair surrounding it and popped it in his mouth. She had been staggering in her black strapless gown at the party and he’d known immediately it would take more than a sugary line and some fancy footwork to gain her interest. He had been willing, she had been able and that was almost two years ago to the day. All that remained for him now was the angst and the guilt. He looked at her now and only felt disdain.

She was watching him do that thing he did so often now, watched him rub the white line around his finger and she did not flinch when she heard the words.

“I don’t want this anymore.” He said.

“Well, you’ve always been sure of what you want…so what, exactly, would that be.” She asked.

He placed the fork down with care, the food looked foul to him now, he never really cared that much for her red sauce.

“To be home. To be home with my wife and my children.”

He looked up and felt light with relief; she was suddenly digging into her food as if recently rescued from a desert island and paused with filled fork in mid air and said with a smile,

“Then that, I expect- is where you should be.”

Little Safe Words

Little Safe Words

In·di·an giv·er (noun)

An offensive term for somebody who gives something back and then asks for its return.

The rhythmic cry came from multiple voices, rising into the air from the playground asphalt.

“Indian giver.”

“Indian giver.”

“Indian giver.”

“Indian giver.”

Claire ran away from the taunting chant, tears dripping down her twelve year old face and out the playground gate. The words beating inside her head like falling rain. All that remained was the small group of white children still yelling loudly after her and laughing.

“Indian giver.”

“Indian giver.”

“Indian giver.”

She ran as fast and long as she could; her pink sketchers slapping loudly on the pavement as the tears continued rolling down her dark cheeks; her lustrous dark hair bouncing wildly behind her. She ran until she realized she couldn’t possibly run all the way back to the reservation and the tears had stopped, cutting off her momentum- so she stopped. Through white knuckled agony she clutched the small homemade necklece in her hand and walked to the nearest bus stop that would begin the long journey home.

Everything I know About Women- A Nutshell-

Christ Mikey looked like death warmed over I thought as I handed him his drink with one hand and threw the blankets and pillows on the couch where he sat with the other. God, he still reeked of smoke. It was late, the house was quiet and I didn’t want to wake her so we talked softly.

“You should go wash up.” I whispered.

“Man o man, she’s really, really pissed.” Mikey said.

I rolled my eyes, “What do ya expect? You come home at 1 am-drunk- with glitter all over your face, smelling like vanilla body spray!”

My friend was not the brightest bulb in the deck. “Your car was in the garage,” I continued, “you live three blocks from a titty bar.”

“Ya, not exactly my moment in the sun is it?” Mikey mused. “Maybe I should get her some flowers…pink ones, I hear those are pretty good.”

“Yes, that’ll fix everything- Oh, I know, how about this…. STOP going to titty bars!”

I really didn’t need this right now but he was, after all, my friend.

“Look Mike, it’s not brain surgery. Women aren’t that complicated ya know.”

He looked at me like I was speaking Chinese. Poor Bastard.

“You need to show her you love her, that she’s the only important thing in your life… that you’d lasso the moon, walk on hot coals, climb any mountain, slay any dragon, die a thousand deaths… simply to make her happy.”

I slid the ice bucket over his way, it looked like he might hurl any moment.

“You’re right, you’re right. Dammit that was stupid of me; I was just gonna go for an hour or two and get back before she even got home. It was just an after work thing with a few of the boys.”

I waited for the idiocy to continue.

“But that one red head is sooo hot; I really think she likes me.”

My God my friend was brain dead.

“Ya man, she absolutely loves you when you’re throwing out 20’s like a ticker tape parade.”

“Mikey, you want to stay married right? I am assuming you want to stay married. If you do then listen to me…listen-to-me.”

I had his inebriated, undivided attention and continued.

“Take however much you spent on dancing tits and ass tonight and triple it, no…no, quadruple it- and get to work.”

I began ticking off his duties on my fingers like a shopping list.

“Flowers, lots and lots of flowers. Red ones dummy, not pink. And you gotta send them to her office, so all her friends and co-workers can see what an amazing guy you are.”

“Dinner, somewhere nice..really nice; where they have at least two forks, and bowls to wash your fingers in, and a guy walking around with a violin nice.”

“Get your ass to Zales, get her something sparkly.”

“Rubbing. Rub every damn thing on her body. Feet-shoulders-neck-anything she wants you to rub…you rub.”

“Talk her hear off but for GOD’s sake do not, at any time, use the word I. Ask her how her day was, if she’s getting along with her boss, if she still wants to take that fucking pottery class you were telling me about. Ask her everything you can think of that relates to her and –this is key- you gotta listen brother. And then ask questions about the actual answers she gives you.”

“Shit, I just had a great idea…ballroom dancing!” Surprise her with some ballroom dancing classes for both of you.” Don’t look at me like that, I’m trying to help you friend.”

I could tell I was losing him, his eyes were heavy like a dying turtle’s and to be honest I was getting pretty tired myself.

“All right Mike. You got all that? I’m telling you, I know these things, just do everything I just told you and then, do it again, and maybe, just maybe… in a month or so you can start getting some action again.”

He was getting up from the couch slowly; he dropped his drink on the floor. And he ignored it.

“Ok, you’re right buddy.” He muttered. “Look, sorry I was such crappy company tonight. I know you’re jammed up right now. Ya know where everything’s at right? Extra blankets are in the hall…how many nights you think you’ll be?”

“Two, maybe three.” I said. “She said I could come back when hell freezes over, that’s usually about 48 hours.”

My Mothers Secret Trade- Flash Fiction

My mother is a whiz with numbers. She loves numbers and early on, she has told me many times, knew she would be what she is. My mother was the CFO for one of the largest corporations in the United States. She didn’t just crunch numbers on a daily basis, she made them do her bidding, and she is a magician with them.

My dad left along time ago, but we don’t need him. Mother made a lot of money working with all those numbers. She’s very social also; well, in a business kind of way. She was always having work parties at the house. Clients, co-workers, the other execs in her massive company come for parties very often. I’d usually be assigned the cute kid duty of passing out party favors; trays of slimy eggs of something on paper thin crackers or slices of raw meat etc, etc. When I did that I very often would here her clients and co-workers talking about her talents, her gift with numbers; they’d often call her an artist.

My mother is an artist with numbers. But what I’ve always known, from the time I was very little is that my mother loves numbers, yes she does, but what my mother has always needed, yearned for and desired above all else was to be a painter. Yes sir, she knew more about painting than she knew about anything else on this earth, besides numbers.

Our house was filled to bursting with art books. Art History, biographies, anthologies anything and everything; if it was about art, we had it. She even bought a original Diego Rivera (he’s a famous painter) and had it on display in her studio.

That was her sanctuary. Her studio was beautiful. Hard pale wood floors in a room filled with light and canvas. She had several easels and they were always filled with a “work in progress.” That’s what she called all of her work. “Works in progress.”

She painted mostly in oils, sometimes with charcoal but mostly oils and her week normally went something like this…

Ten, eleven, sometimes twelve hour day and my mother would come home, we’d have a quick dinner (she was always adamant about eating together) and then she’d go off to her studio in the back of the house. I never knew for how long. Sometimes just a few hours but if she was “in the zone” as she called it, it could be all night. The weekend were all for painting though. She would make one Saturday each month specifically designated for us however and that one beautiful day each month we spend the entire day together and as much as possible, weather permitting, outside in the “specter of nature.” She always said that too. My mother had a lot of sayings as you can tell.

She kept it all to herself which I always thought was strange. I mean, I knew about them of course but that was the one room that was always locked when we had guests and I was only allowed in there in her company. And she never talked about her own painting in public but she always talked about others. “The Masters,” as she called them; she loved to talk about the masters every chance she got. Especially with art people, we frequently used “our Saturdays” to go to gallery openings and she’d gab up all the artists and dealers about the masters. But she liked having me in her studio when she painted. She said it kept her focused.

I’m pretty sure she never felt anything was good enough and sometimes, as she worked, she’d get a very sad look on her face, move her head this way and that, trying to take in every angle and line on whatever was currently “in progress.” Sometimes she’d even start crying and sometimes she’d grab the canvas, throw it fiercely on the ground with disgust and step on it. Smash it into bits. Anyway, she never talked about her painting with anyone but me and that was fine with me. I liked her stuff and she always looked more beautiful to me in that speckled white smock with all the pockets and splashes of every color in the rainbow all over it than she ever did in her suits and slacks.

Eventually I went to college, moved out, and got a life of my own. I still see my mother at least once every Saturday a month for our day. She’s retired now and no longer an artist, a magician, with numbers. Not for a paycheck anyway. She still paints though, every day, and I have a house full of them to prove it.