#3: Matted Youth

The car moved down the bumpy road in a suitable manner.  Suitable because it dampened just enough to check the occupant’s annoyance with the half hour journey.  No lights illuminated the road but the black chasm overhead contained countless stars. 

Far from the city, four college freshmen hauled down a back road.  Their cares were limited to what song was currently blaring, who had gum, and if enough beers remained to get them to their destination. 

Maple, willow oak, and plain oak lined both sides of the road in splotches.  One of the occupants, Samantha, slid deep in her seat and tossed her head back into the headrest at an angle.  Above, the bare branches sliced a full moon in quick succession, the journey a straw stop motion picture.

“Do you think he’s gonna be there?” she asked.

“Listen Sam.  You need to stop worrying about it, really.  He’s only in town for a week and you’ll only see him tonight, c’mon,” replied a female occupant in the passenger seat. 

One of the boys sighed irreverently, but she didn’t notice in the slightest.  Overhead the moon waned and slipped from the side window frame.  Samantha craned her slender neck over the rest and peered upwards through the hatchbacks angled trunk window.  There the moon lay at the top of her vision, constant and unobstructed by any branches. 

She drank in the pocked foam surface.  Though the car pitched and careened, she pressed her head tight until the image stabilized.  She took a moment to reflect on the present.  It was their first winter break of college and all were oblivious to the eventual dissolution of childhood friendships.  The present journey was to a farmhouse that several peers who attended the local college were house sitting.  Her aim was to bump into and at least flirt with an acquaintance she had known briefly in high school before he moved to an exclusive prep school.      

The moment held immeasurable promise.  Everyone she cared for presently was either in the car or at her destination.  Her soul welled until she was convinced she could transcend the glass and alight amongst the heavens.  The moon shimmered in acknowledgment.

The car approached the Victorian manor from a gravel driveway.  Its windows were draped in black curtains and white Christmas candles gave it a grand, deep appearance.  The owners were a retired couple that had two grown daughters and several dogs.  Samantha had recognized the last name from high school sports memorabilia. 

Strategically parking as to not block any other cars, they quickly disembarked and rang a side doorbell.  An external corner light held their warm breath aloft in the frigid night.  Through the haze Samantha could make out a close shoreline and hear water gently lapping against breakwater.  Although she was a country girl at heart, her semester in the city had lent her break a surreal gloss. 

“Oh. My. God,” shrieked her best friend Tina flinging open the door.  They embraced in a wide legged stance rocking side to side carelessly. 

Samantha pulled away and took in the home.  Several red velvet couches ringed a white stone fireplace.  A pair of golden retrievers scampered underfoot of people gathered at the kitchen island drinking.  

After shedding her coat and helping herself to a drink, she settled amongst her friends dispensing and sharing epic tales of a new life away from home.  At some point amidst a drinking game, she saddled up next to the acquaintance. 

“Ben, right?” she asked.  She framed the question upwards through lashes. 

“Yea….. Samantha?  Wow it’s been years.  I think the last time I saw you, we were on the river.”

She nodded and studied him.  He had grown into his lanky frame and his hair was longer than she recalled.  Dark curls hung loosely about his brow, framing hazel eyes.  She felt suddenly short of words and breath.

They monopolized each other's time for a while before he proposed a question.

“Do you wanna get high?  No big deal if not, I just thought you might like to.”  She hadn’t smoked in high school but had a few times in college and was beginning to enjoy it.

“Sure.  I’d love to,” she replied.  She meant it in earnest but she also wanted to seem agreeable.  Besides, he had broached the subject with such confidence she had to accept.  They went outside to the brick stoop and shared a small pipe.  Since much had already been discussed, they spent the majority of the time staring off into the night in different directions.  Their breath formed fast moving cumulus clouds in the light cutting through the slower cirrus pipe smoke.                

Wordlessly they reentered the house.  Samantha donning a slightly guilty smirk as she mixed herself another drink. 

“Someone seems to be hitting it off quite well.  And that perfume…yes I’d say quite well,” Tina offered.  “C’mon.  Let’s go to the bathroom upstairs and chat.”  The two bounded up the carpeted hardwood staircase drinks in hand.

“I think that you two would be a good couple Sam.  Really I do,” Tina stated while she applied more mascara. 

“You think?  I mean we do have some things in common, but the Midwest is awfully far away for weekend visits.”  She realized the absurdity of her comment.

“Jesus Sam.  You’re getting way ahead of yourself.  Just have a good time tonight.  See where things go.  You shouldn’t get high, it makes you too sensible.  See ya downstairs,” she said as she squeezed her shoulder.

Samantha closed her clutch and glanced impartially at the wallpaper.  Small aquatic creatures, mostly seahorse, were frozen in an off-white sea.  She reasoned that this must be the children’s bathroom for the low doorknob height and lack of toiletries.    

Instead of going directly downstairs via the hallway, she absconded through the connecting room, which she discovered to be a bedroom.  She flicked on the light revealing red walls complete with an alcove and recessed lighting.  Casually she glanced at some middle school portraits.  One in particular had her in near hysterics.  A midnight blue metallic background played host to permed hair, oversized plastic glasses and bandless braces. 

She moved down the line and witnessed the progression from awkwardness to beauty.  Like the daughter, Samantha was graced with high cheekbones and olive skin.  She felt slightly voyeuristic but compelled to stay.

Gracing the alcove’s built in shelf was a series of varsity letters and newspaper clippings.  She scanned them.  Samantha had been a stand out field hockey player in high school, but this girl was highly touted and had landed a DI scholarship.  The clippings had progressed from yellow and the edges were beginning to rust.  When she touched them, dust and pulp formed a singular grit. 

She gradually became aware of the rooms imperfections.  The window screen was frayed and loose in one corner, a cobweb strung across the ceiling light fixture.  In the corners of the alcove and on its shelves myriad ladybugs lay belly up, their nail polish red forever censored. 

It occurred to Samantha that the parents had little use for this room anymore.  The pictures in the living room were of freshly minted families, another generation; the most recent photographs in this room were of high school.  She suddenly felt profound loss and confusion.  She knew she would return one day to her own room and find it in this state of disrepair and disuse.  It was as if her life had flashed before her and then she had moved on unwillingly.  She wanted to freeze herself in a candid newspaper shot, her being fashioned of crumbling sepia.

Samantha returned to the kitchen to a thinned gathering.  She mixed herself another drink for solace and inquired to Tina about Ben’s whereabouts.

“Sam, you were up there for like an hour.  He left ten minutes ago.  Got bored, I guess.”

That seemed a small tragedy to her.  She settled in with the rhythm of the conversation, her mind never committing.  It wasn’t that her friends were less pertinent; she felt she had discovered something unheralded.  Unsure of herself she coasted, wondering when, not if, the surreal gloss of home would set.

#2: A Baltimore Love Thing

“More coffee hon?” she asks.  Her tone is sincere, too sincere for this hour he thinks.  There’s also the matter of her judicious use of ‘hon.’  She had been using it from the initial greet to the presentation of the bill.  Maybe Baltimore stereotypes do hold water, he thinks.   

“No. I’m fine,” he replies with a guarded smirk.

He settles deeper into the plush vinyl diner booth.  The striated back soothes his backside, which is nearly numb from the trip.  Baltimore marked his fifth major city.  Every morning he woke with a start; eyes darting to every corner and window, his cerebrum slow to piece together his exact locale.        

Working in sales had its perks.  The expense accounts, free rental upgrades, the seemingly endless sushi.  Sometimes he swore he could tell exact temperatures of rooms from the mercury coursing in his veins.  Clients lack imagination. 

It also taxed.  He hadn’t had a stable monogamous relationship in five years and dealt with loneliness with hotel bars, tasteful suits and reality TV.  He avoided doing anything to excess; smoking and drinking claimed both his grandfathers before he was born. 

Overall he is satisfied with his trajectory.  Middle management seemed an inevitability once they put him to pasture from the road.  He calls a comfortable condo on Chicago’s north side home.  The furnishings had become less personal though upon every return.  The bourgeoisie and the hotels they frequent lack imagination.

For vices he gambles on sports.  Mostly professional, he fully embraces the country’s sports obsessed psyche.  It gave him an internal excuse to spend evenings engrossed at sports bars and chatting up anyone who would lend an ear.  Being in a town during one of their big games was definitive to his own story.  Without the incentive of winning though, he would enjoy it less.  Americans lack imagination.

The cab ride from the hotel to the diner had been soothing.  Outside a February rain fell, chunks of frozen bits lubricated the windshield but the wipers squealed protests. 

“New blades, huh?”

The driver bobbed his baseball-capped head slowly forward and back in recognition.

He chuckled to himself at the rhetorical nature of his question.  The blades tracked perfect convex lines that gave the impression the windshield was a huge turntable spinning two vinyl records in tandem.  He thought about tomorrow’s agenda.  Hotel breakfast, ten o’clock meeting with the in-house creative services team, eleven-thirty lunch meeting with the ad sales team.  Back to the hotel for a power nap and recovery from the several martinis sure to be consumed.  A rare phone check-in with his manager would proceed an early dinner.  Later he might find himself in a cab on the way to a diner.  He failed to notice his lack of imagination.

“You in town for like… business?”  The question forces his head and neck upwards like a heeling dog. 

“Excuse me?  Didn’t catch that….”

“Ya know hon, business.  You have that bleary-eyed look.  Your collar needs some starch and you’ve been staring at your check for quite some time.” 

“I’m a little tired yea, but I don’t want more coffee.  Could use some crayons though, ya know?  To draw on these pretty placemats.”

“Crowns?  Sorry we don’t keep those,” she turns back towards the bar.  It is only then that he realizes he is the last customer in the joint.

“Wait… I was just kidding.  I will take some more coffee actually.”  She glides back to his booth with pot in hand.  It is only then that he realizes she is somewhat attractive.  A knockout no; baby crow’s feet grace her temples and her makeup is tired from an all day shift.  Her plain floral dress snugs against the outside of wide, pleasantly pronounced hips.  God, he thinks, I lack serious imagination.

“To answer your question, yes I’m here on business.”  The pour hesitates slightly.  The response is unexpected.  “Are you some kind of psychic?  A psychic who moonlights as a waitress.”  A smile is earned.  Her forehead crinkles and crow’s feet flex.

“No.  I’m just plain Jane, serve ya coffee, serve ya sandwiches, Debby waitress.”

“So which is it, Jane or Debby?”  More crinkling as she brushes her black hair behind an ear. 

“I go by Sarah.  And you, what do they cawl you hon?”

The ‘hon’ makes him blush this time.  It disarms and no longer annoys.

“I’m Jonathan.  So Sarah, this place looks to be somewhat deserted.  Why don’t you put up your tired feet and share a cup with me?”  No sense in retreating at this point.

“Well gee golly whiz, plain ole’ me conversing with a fancy business man.  All, be.”  She flips her hair mockingly one hand on her hip, the other cuffed beneath her ear.  She returns with a porcelain cup and fresh pot.

“So Jonathan, what type of business are you in exactly?”  He can’t tell if her tone is coy or sarcastic.  She’s nervous and covering it, he thinks.

“Well, I sell advertising.  See that billboard over there?”  He gestures to the distant harbored cityscape glowing up through the window.  “Well you can’t see it from up here, but I have  a few products that I maintain around the harbor.” 

Sarah leans forward on her elbow places her mouth on her wrist and takes him in for the first time.  She makes eye contact.  She gives slight pause.     

“I hope it’s not Phillip’s.  That place claims they make the best crabcakes, but I know for a fact they use more filler than they would care to admit.  My ex took me there once – ” She breaks the contact and eyes dart to the black and white tile. 

“We all have skeletons,” he offers.  “No sense in parading them about, especially to people whom you’ve just met.” 

“I agree, no sense in p’rading.  Say, what’s your favorite color?”  The false air had been dropped and a forced cheerfulness squeezed through muslin arises to take its place, altogether as forged. 

This time he betrays himself with a gaze that peers away from her face to the neon of the harbor below.  She obliges a smile and they both draw upon their mugs.  Good intentions abound in the air. 

“I should start my shift work, it’s really getting on.” 

“Why don’t you finish up and we can continue this?  I’m staying just up the way.”

“What…. what’s ‘this’ exactly?”  They both mirror smiles.  He cocks his head slightly and in doing so, acquiesces first.  Without further word, she slides out into the aisle.  His lack of imagination startles him.  

For the next five minutes, he alternates between sidelong steals of her polishing and the bottom of his mug.  He doles out cash for the bill and leaves a precisely appropriated tip.  On go his coat, rich deerskin gloves and bowler.  He walks stiff and upright down the length of a bar with a measured gait. 

“Green.  I’ve always been partial to green.”  She pauses half-hunched and wipes a lone drop of brow sweat with a backhand.  Her eyes loosely focus on the window with a view, neon fuzz growing and swelling until the diner itself is ablaze. 

“That’s nice,” she whispers.  Her gaze not breaking stride she delivers the colloquial epilogue reserved for all: “You come back now hon, ya hear.”

Jonathan glances at the empty whiteness of her eyes and advances quickly to the door.  He shudders deeper than the night dictates as he scans for a cab.  Suddenly the well-appointed hotel bar seems enticing; perhaps they will be showing a west coast game.              

#1: Old Bulls

A low-slung moon spills in the tiny window by the open shelves like a frozen case job. 

Bradley takes a short pull from the hexagonal glass, the legs of the dark liquor restless and long to settle.  Perched atop a folding kitchen chair from the 50s, his gruff, grey winter beard hides a deceivingly soft jaw line and tiny pock marks. 

“Martha, bring me my slippers when you come.  The floor is practically on fire!”

He realizes how bitter winter makes him, especially New England ones.  It has intensified with each of late; growing out his beard in the fall is an itchy chore and no longer pleasurable. 

He rises and approaches the kitchen potbelly stove.  Bradley slowly takes one knee, cocks his head and swoops low near the grated door. 

“Christ,” he says.  “Damn wood is whistling wet.  Should have known better than to trust that swindling excuse for a neighbor.  Tree was only fell since late fall.”

He opens the furnace door.  Straw oak peers at him.  Heavy smoke perforating every split and crevasse, upwards climbing towards the heavens like an ancestral signal willing its way through the narrow stovepipe, creosote pulsating and sparkling to the unfettered rhythm.  A few harsh pokes, a few exaggerated grunts and the meager flames fan.

He returns to the chair, slumps and takes a long pull from the glass extinguishing the contents.  His chapped lips burn as the liquid vapes.  He realizes that Martha is taking unusually long.  He realizes he feels spinning drunk – an intense stage of buzz that rarely lasts.  He wonders if she is actually taking long or if his sense of time is skewed.  His face is flush from the stove and scotch, his feet burn from the cold tile and mind throbs from the woodpile betrayal, and the scotch.

“Brad, again…. tonight?!”  Martha says as she gestures towards the suddenly debased bottle.

Bradley doesn’t wait to be told.  Slippers are snatched from clenched fists, stepped into forcefully, rifle is slung from the right shoulder and he stomps out into the night.  A few minutes are taken as his eyes adjust to the grey blue which blankets the farm.  Shadows reserved for the day are where they should appear, but more intense, the black deeper.

He scans the foreground.  Soft rolling contours of dirt pass for hills, latticed posts pass for western fences.  His property line extends out of eyesight from his current position, day or night, and abuts the Ramer plot on three sides.  Bradley’s means stem from a government pension, he served two tours in Southeast Asia in the 70s, and cold cash garnered from the slaughter house.  Two hundred Hereford head bray lowly and crowd to stave the chill.  His fence line used to extend further onto the Ramer land via a grandfathered right-of-way, but the eldest son quickly put an end to that when he took the reins this past summer.  It made for several weeks of painstaking post digging in the heat, not to mention the recent sale of a half cord of questionable firewood.

Bradley sighs and steps towards the closest fence line when an unmistakable sound grips the hollow air.  Deep on the westerly fence line, line of sight disrupted by a downward slope, frantic brays coupled with a gnashing of thick skulls and hooves on the frozen ground serve as a prelude to panicked yelps and quick snarls. 

“Damn cai-yote.  Poor timing,” he chuckles humorlessly.  He consciously left horns on a few of the biggest most senior bulls.  A nightmare for the slaughterhouse hands, but insurance against losing small calves and cows to the omnipresent menace.  On a usual night he would hear the combat from bed and rest easy.  On a usual night he wouldn’t be this drunk, on a usual night he wouldn’t be fuming from his wife’s grumblings or neighbor’s recent actions.

He walks to the near fence line, stops and backtracks his gaze to his house.  The small A-frame was built in the 70s with lent money from his parents who sympathized with his emotional scars from the war.  It was the summer of ’74 that he started raising cattle, the winter of ’76 he married Martha, and the bottle sometime during ’77.  The land and herd held all his equity, the house was in dire need of remodeling, but Bradley had no intention of undertaking that anytime soon. 

He pulls out a slender 100, fumbles with the metal lighter and inhales a few quick drags. 

No, the house wasn’t a priority, he thinks as he slides over the bottom rung of the interior fence.  Martha could consider it an eyesore in the face of the Ramer’s new log cabin and Bradley wouldn’t give a damn. 

Moving with purpose now.  The sound of the struggle still pitching.  Eyes adjusted to the steely ambiance, rifle un-slung and held under the crook of his shoulder.  The key was to approach from above, survey, fire a few warning shots and retreat victorious.  A chain-smoking, hard drinking vet of a Jesus, tending, always tending.

The struggle dies down.  He sees a few flashes of white horn in the light, one might have been stained red, can’t tell.  Two bulls, one horned, surround several cows and a calf.  There is no sign of the intruder.  They stamp nervously, pupils shine wide-eyed, but the threat passes.

He laughs a smoker’s cackle and pitches to and fro on uneven earth. 

“They knew better than to stick around,” he says to the group. 

The bolt action snaps open then closed, safety never on like a wily gunslinger; smooth large caliber brass rises into place the rim slamming against the barrel opening halting a premeditated skyward launch.  Two clicks of the trigger and pin send plumes of fire from the barrel’s end, the bulls’ sockets glare against the flare.  Quick snap of the wrist, forestock slams into outstretched offhand, shock against his gold wedding ring like a mini report, single fluid move shell ejected, spring advances, heel of his hand locks the bolt handle’s silver marble down – He exhales sharply through his nostrils, his trigger finger drifting off course. Something catches his eye beyond the exterior fence.

The main reason for the Ramer boy revising the property line was so their main farmhouse footprint could be increased via a deck addition.  A monstrosity of a thing, the porch was unscreened, yet fully furnished.

Despite being a couple hundred yards away, Bradley had the advantage of elevation.  He swore he saw something pass through his line of sight across the porch and obstruct an interior light.  Why this registers as his business, he can’t self-articulate, but feels an urge to investigate.  Not enough time would have elapsed after the report for someone to react and venture outside.  No, whatever it is had to have been outside prior and surely had seen the muzzle flash. 

Something inside of him tugs on his shoulders in the direction of his A-frame, back to the sputtering fire, the lamentations of his wife, the vapor of the dissipating bottle like a bottled apparition suddenly released.  He shoulders his rifle, crouches and moves to flank the porch from the north. 

Sometimes it is best to leave the horns on the patched and weathered ones, he thinks.