A Good Appetite John Ragusa Because I love food, I was eager to dine at Brandley’s Restaurant. My friend Scotty recommended the place. “You like seafood, don’t you, Allen?” he asked. “Yes, indeed,” I replied. “Oysters on the half shell are my favorite.” “I don’t care for raw oysters myself,” Scotty said. “I prefer them fried. With a thick hot sauce, they are superb! Anyway, I suggest that you go to a seafood restaurant called Brandley’s. It has the best food I’ve ever tasted.” “It’s that good, huh?” “You bet. Every bite tasted like more.” “Are the prices reasonable?” “Yes. The atmosphere is nice, too.” “How’s the service?” “It’s top-notch. Stop over at Brandley’s and try their cuisine. You’ll be pleased with it.” “I’ll go there the first chance I get,” I said. “You’ll be glad you took my advice,” Scotty said. * * * I enjoy eating more than anything. I do it whether I’m hungry or not. I like all kinds of food, no matter how it’s served. As you’ve probably guessed, my size is enormous. I know it’s not good for my health to eat so much, but I can’t help myself. The urge to consume food is overwhelming. My weight increases the chances for a heart attack and diabetes, but I couldn’t go on a diet if I tried. My appetite is always big. I constantly shop for bigger clothes because I gain weight all the time. It costs me a lot of money. Every time I have a meal, I go for seconds. I never eat small portions. I’ve been an overeater all my life. I suppose it’s because I was given large meals as a child. I ate a lot of candy, too. My sugar intake was considerable. Each time I step on the scale, I find that I’ve put on many pounds. I hate to look in the mirror because I keep getting bigger. I swear I look like a whale. When I walk down the street, I huff and puff a great deal. Every night I pray to God that I can cut down on the food I eat. Maybe someday I’ll be able to do this. Meat has always been my biggest weakness. I could feast on steak every day of the week. I’ve been to just about every restaurant in the city. They all serve good food. I love desserts of all kinds, especially pies. I’d kill for a good chocolate cream pie. My mother was the best cook in the world. She could make any dish scrumptious. Her baked bread was terrific. It was always fresh and moist. I went to Brandley’s one weekend. I was looking forward to having a great meal. I entered the restaurant. A waiter approached me. “Reservations, sir?” “Not tonight,” I said. “Follow me, please.” He led me to a table and handed me a menu. “I shall return shortly.” I studied the contents. I was delighted to find lobster. I also saw baked potato, which I adore, and gumbo, which is always a winner. Presently, the waiter came back to take my order. “What will you be having?” “I’ll have lobster, a baked potato, gumbo, and draft beer.” “Good enough.” He wrote down the order and walked to the kitchen. I drank some of my water. I dreaded the thought of the added pounds I’d gain after this meal. After a while, the waiter finally arrived with my dinner. It was steaming hot, and there was lots of lobster on my plate. So far, so good. After I said grace, I dug in. I must confess I wasn’t bowled over by the quality. The lobster wasn’t tasty. The baked potato was dry and gooey. It swished around in my mouth like quicksand. The gumbo was watery, too. I couldn’t wait to tell Scotty how wrong he was about Brandley’s food. * * * “You advised me badly, Scotty,” I told him the next day. “You gave Brandley’s a rave review. Well, I went there and tried their food. It was absolutely awful.” “You’re kidding me!” “No, I’m serious. It was totally tasteless.” “That surprises me. I loved their meals.” “They didn’t impress me at all.” “I’m sorry for recommending them.” “Forget it. I just won’t go there again.” * * * I ran into Scotty the following week. “I went over to Brandley’s and told them how you felt about their cooking,” he said. “They were stunned. They promised that they would cook better food from now on. Why don’t you give them another chance, Allen?” I sighed. “All right. I’ll try them again. But if they haven’t improved, I’ll let them know about it.” * * * When I arrived at Brandley’s that evening, the place was packed with people. Judging by the way they were attacking their plates, I figured they loved the food. A waiter found me a table after 20 minutes. I was already getting impatient. I didn’t think I’d enjoy myself any more than I did the last time. I ordered a seafood platter and iced tea. This time, I couldn’t believe my taste buds. I had never eaten anything so good before! Suddenly, Scotty came in and ran to my table. “Allen, I must tell you something,” he said urgently. “What is it?” “I know why Brandley’s food is so much better than before. A chef here told me that they now use voodoo to make their meals taste delicious.” “That’s absurd, Scotty!” “It’s the truth. And that’s not all. The magic potion is deadly.” “Is it poisonous?” “No. It makes the food so good, a person can’t stop eating it. He goes on consuming it until he dies.” I didn’t believe that at first, but now I do. I haven’t been able to stop eating Brandley’s food. I keep ordering more and more. “Waiter,” I said, “bring me a big dish of chocolate cream pie, please.”

Satan’s Lair Mel Waldman My father warned me and my friends to stay away from the tunnels of Satan’s Lair. But we went there anyway. We live in Orangeburg, New York. On that fateful August day, we drove to the top of Clausland Mountain. The mountain has miles of secret tunnels built by the army a long time ago. I’ve heard rumors the army built a secret base throughout the mountain during World War I. Dad told us the mountain also has secret caverns and passageways and plenty of corpses. “It’s an evil place. A Satanic cult goes there to practice dark rituals. Do you understand, boys?” We looked quizzically at Dad. “In those tunnels, there have been plenty of suicides and homicides.” Dad scared the hell out of us. And yet, we were drawn to the mountain and its horrific secrets. We found a marked trail on top of a cliff and followed it down the mountain for what seemed an eternity. And we came to the dark tunnels of Satan’s Lair. It was 3 o’clock on a dog day afternoon. An oppressive sprawling sun lit up the mountain. Yet we were about to enter an evil place that belonged to another season, another time. Only fifteen, I was the youngest and 4th boy to enter the tunnel we chose to explore. Joe, a tough, rebellious, stocky seventeen-year-old boy, had a flashlight and so did I. Joe led the way, pointing his flashlight into the pitch-black darkness. Tom and Bill, two lanky sixteen-year-old kids, followed Joe, and I followed Bill into the eerie darkness. We slithered through the tunnel and even with my flashlight, I became disoriented. I don’t know how long we were inside. But I wanted to turn back. Joe ordered us to keep moving. And so we did. Silently, I panicked, overwhelmed by a crippling claustrophobia that gripped my throat and choked me. “Let’s go back,” I begged. But Joe laughed maniacally and so did Tom and Bill. We continued on. Now, time seemed frozen and soon, the temperature dropped suddenly and drastically. “Let’s go back, Joe!” I cried out. “It’s freezing in here.” “Soon, Johnny. Soon.” Tom and Bill complained. But Joe ordered us to keep moving. Suddenly, we heard Joe’s frightening screams. “Help!” he cried out. A few minutes later, Tom cried out. And then I heard Bill’s shrieks, followed by a long, ominous silence. I came to an illuminated, tomblike room filled with fresh and old corpses sprawled across the icy floor. The room contained dozens of skeletons too. Above me, a dead man, with a tight noose around his broken neck, swung back and forth. The old man’s noose was attached to a long, thick rope tied to a ten-foot ceiling. I stood up and searched the room. No sign of my buddies. But in the far corner, I saw a large hole in the wall. I moved gingerly toward it, but stopped short when I heard the howling wind and monstrous shrieks coming from inside the hole. Still a dark, powerful force was pulling me into the hole. “Joe, Bill, Tom!” I cried out. But I heard only deafening, inhuman sounds, as I leaped backwards away from the magnetic hole, perhaps a black hole or wormhole or Hell itself. “I’ll come back for you, old buddies,” I shouted. Then I turned around and crawled into the dark tunnel. I slithered toward the outside world. Behind me, thundering, alien sounds followed me into the tunnel. Would I live to see the sun rise another day? Would I find my way home? Listening to the silent voices of my friends, I kept moving toward freedom and life.

BIO Mel Waldman, Ph. D. Dr. Mel Waldman is a licensed New York State psychologist and a candidate in Psychoanalysis at the Center for Modern Psychoanalytic Studies (CMPS). He is also a poet, writer, artist, and singer/songwriter. After 9/11, he wrote 4 songs, including “Our Song,” which addresses the tragedy. His stories have appeared in numerous literary reviews and commercial magazines including HAPPY, SWEET ANNIE PRESS, POETICA, CHILDREN, CHURCHES AND DADDIES and DOWN IN THE DIRT (SCARS PUBLICATIONS), PBW, NEW THOUGHT JOURNAL, THE BROOKLYN LITERARY REVIEW, HARDBOILED, HARDBOILED DETECTIVE, DETECTIVE STORY MAGAZINE, ESPIONAGE, and THE SAINT. He is a past winner of the literary GRADIVA AWARD in Psychoanalysis and was nominated for a PUSHCART PRIZE in literature. Periodically, he has given poetry and prose readings and has appeared on national T.V. and cable T.V. He is a member of Mystery Writers of America, Private Eye Writers of America, American Mensa, Ltd., and the American Psychological Association. He is currently working on a mystery novel inspired by Freud’s case studies. Who Killed the Heartbreak Kid?, a mystery novel, was published by iUniverse in February 2006. It can be purchased at www.iuniverse.com/bookstore/, www.bn.com, at Amazon.com, and other online bookstores or through local bookstores. Some of his poems have appeared online in THE JERUSALEM POST. Dark Soul of the Millennium, a collection of plays and poetry, was published by World Audience, Inc. in January 2007. It can be purchased at www.worldaudience.org, www.bn.com, at Amazon.com, and other online bookstores or through local bookstores. A 7-volume short story collection was published by World Audience, Inc. in May 2007 and can also be purchased online at the above-mentioned sites. I AM A JEW, a book in which Dr. Waldman examines his Jewish identity through memoir, essays, short stories, poetry, and plays, was published by World Audience, Inc. in January 2008.

The Prophet of Prospect Park Patrick Trotti At first it felt kind of weird, but after a while I got used to it. Some people actually called me gifted, but I like to think of it as common sense. I can still remember the first person that gave me their palm, turned upward, and allowed me to “read” their future. Of course, I had no formal training and no real clue as to what I was doing. It was a sunny Saturday afternoon and I had set up shop right next to the last stand at the farmer’s market in Prospect Park. I usually played some music; I still had my trumpet that my mom bought me when I turned seventeen. That was the last birthday that I spent with her before she died. Recently I had read in the paper that a man down in Union Square was making a hundred dollars a day or more by telling people their fortune. It was some slice of life piece done half assed in the Times but it seemed simple enough. I’d like to think that I got the idea from my grandmother. I do remember her, when she was living with me and my mom when I was younger, always fiddling around with her various decks of tarot cards. All day she would sit by the window on the first floor with her cup of tea, pack of Marlboro Red’s and her cards half prognosticating our family’s collective future, half surveying the neighborhood. All I had to do was put up a sign on a cardboard box saying, “Have your fortune read by a real person, not some psychic freak!” and a cup for change and I was ready to begin. A middle aged Spanish woman knelt down across from me and smiled. “Tell me a little about myself so I know that you’re for real. Then you can name your price for the fortune telling. Deal?” I simply nodded and asked for her hand. What she failed to realize was that it had nothing to do with the lines on her palm, although she did have a lot of them. As I pretended to read her callused hand I was really scanning her for any clues. Tucked beneath her jacket I could make out scrubs with the name “Windsor Terrace” stitched on her breast along with the head of a dog and on her left forearm she had a tattoo: “R.I.P. Jacob- 1/13/03-7/24/06.” I had more than enough information to get lunch and cigarettes out of her. “I see that you’ve had tragedy in your past. I’m sensing that you lost someone very close to you, possibly a son or a nephew, that was young. And ever since then you’ve kept busy by focusing on your work. You love your job as a veterinarian assistant because you love animals.” She just stood there frozen in time looking back and forth between my two eyes half like she was trying to figure out if we’ve ever met before. Finally, she cleared her throat. “How did you, how did you know all that?” “What can I say? I have a gift. Now, twenty dollars and I’ll read your future. Do you have anything in particular you want to know about?” “Umm...no, not really. Just tell me whatever you can.” I could see by the look in her eyes and her body language that I had her before she even handed me the money. Whatever I told her now was just icing on the cake. She looked beat up and tired, as if she lived a very hard life so I decided to give her a positive proclamation. It was the easiest money I’d ever made. The rest of the day was relatively easy. I had another thirteen customers, most of whom already looked as though they wanted to believe in me before saying a single word. I guess confidence was the key to the whole thing, well that, and a burgeoning line waiting for my services. By sunset word was spreading quickly, I was the boy with all the answers, a prophet of sorts. It became a regular gig and eventually I had made enough money to put a roof over my head, albeit at the local Y, and get a few hot meals in me every day. Things were good, real good until one day this man approached me with a look of both anger and sadness that scared me. “You the fortune boy?” He muttered as he came closer. “Fortune teller.” I weakly responded fearing that it would be someone looking for a refund. “Yeah my girl, she came to you a few weeks back. Well she told me that you said she’d be fine and that even though she was sick she’d get better. Guess what? She died the other day and do you know why she died? Because she refused to go get her treatment at the hospital! No matter what I said to her she wouldn’t listen, she just kept saying that you told her that everything would be fine. You’ve got blood on your hands!” Then he spit a ball of clear phlegm in my direction, hitting me in the shoulder. I’ll never forget those eyes; piercing through me as if he could see through to my soul, scorching the little hairs on the back of my neck and deflating the weeks of self confidence that I had built up. I remained silent fearful that I would just further upset him if I tried to defend myself. “Look, I’m pretty busy sir, so if you don’t mind?” I hoped that he wouldn’t see through my thinly veiled attempt at getting around a potentially awkward argument. “You got no customers that I can see and as long as I’m in the neighborhood I’ll make sure that it’ll stay that way!” The look of anger had morphed to a call to arms as I feared that he may attack me at any moment. I had few options and even fewer good ones. “Look, I admit, I fucked up. I’m human and I make mistakes but it’s unfair to blame me for what happened to your wife. Unfortunate as it is, and it is a tragedy, what am I supposed to do?” “You should be held accountable!” He declared. His eyes grew bigger. “Maybe you’re right but that won’t bring her back, will it? How about this, I give you your money back and we call it even.” “You think you can sweet talk your way out of this?” “No, I’m just offering a solution. What about me giving you half of my profits for every day that I’m out here working? You can come and meet me every night and I’ll split my money with you.” The man stood there motionless as if a movement would somehow derail his thought process. After a few minutes he stepped closer for what I feared would be the start of a fight but instead he extended his right hand. “You got yourself a deal.” He mumbled as a lone tear rand down his cheek. I exhaled promising myself that I would never rip off another person again. Later that day I applied for a part time job as a door to door community canvasser for a local politician. And even though it still has to do with me fabricating facts and bending the truth at least I don’t feel as guilty. Oh, and I never stepped foot in Prospect Park again.

Patrick Trotti brief bio (02/16/10) Patrick Trotti is a 24 year old college student from New York majoring in Creative Writing. His fiction has appeared at Glass Cases, Six Sentences and Eskimo Pie, and he is currently working on editing his first novel. You can also hear from Patrick Trotti at his blog at http://www.patricktrotti.blogspot.com any time.

Auction House for the Soul Robert Brabham By chance, his eyes caught the light shining from the large entrance of the building. AUCTIONS, it said in red paint on an old rusty sign hanging aslant near the corner. There were a dozen or so silhouettes milling around the entrance, some conversing. Instinct seemed to draw him forward like an insect towards the brassy illumination. He hadn’t the slightest interest in bidding on some dead fart’s junk, but where else was he going to spend the last night of his life? Jake caught the scent of funnel cake and... popcorn... now some sausage and onions. As he strode towards the auction building, he felt as though he was walking along the midway of some state fair. For a moment he waxed nostalgic at the idea of enjoying a roller coaster or some other vertiginous venture. Someone belched loudly somewhere in the darkness. A new sound emerged. It was a man’s voice, as mellifluous as it was commanding. It had the bark of a salesman and the glibness of an entertainer. Jake wished to avoid this man and find a seat quickly inside. “.... something for everyone. It’s here. Don’t be afraid to ask...” Damned carny salesman, Jake thought bitterly. Thank God the doorway was wide for he was apt to slip inside unnoticed – oh damn, the guy was selling the tickets. Jake sighed and crept over to the voice. The light shone golden on the right side of the man’s face. It appeared kind and terribly prescient at the same time, perhaps the countenance of a man who knows people love to buy other people’s crap. “Very good evening, sir! Welcome to our auction. Admittance three dollars please, if you wish to participate.” His teeth looked perfect. His hair was thick and dark except for gray at the temples. His hands were large, but seemed delicate. Jake held out a rumpled five dollar bill he had fished from his pocket. “Excellent.” Why’d I do that? I’m not going to bid. The man handed Jake two dollars and offered, “Don’t spend it all at once.” Jake said nothing and stepped inside, faintly hearing the man chuckling. Great entertainment. You get what you pay for. Should have left him the two bucks for that brilliant quip. Suddenly, a loud noise on an overhead speaker - BE SEATED, WE SHALL BEGIN IN FIVE MINUTES. Wooden bleacher seats ran along each wall and led to a small stage at the end of the metal building. It seemed like a large number of people for a weekday night. Jake turned left, climbed to the top row, and sat alone on the uncomfortable wood. The din of light conversation drifted, extraordinarily subdued for a rustic crowd, Jake thought. He remembered the small motel at which he was staying. He thought of the Rubenesque owner who smoked and prattled on, with lipstick stained teeth, so stereotypically. He thought of his tiny room with stained wallpaper and musty scent. He thought of lying in those sandpaper sheets another night. Why’d I come in here? Men and women began entering the stage with chairs and fold out desks, the sort one would use for a TV dinner. There were six of them, two women and four men. They were dressed corporate casual. Jake wondered what would be offered first. This arrangement seemed rather odd. For a blinding second, Jake wondered if these people were going to burst into hymn to commence the auction. Dammit! A young woman sitting at the bottom bleacher stood suddenly and hurried to the front door. He could hear the ticket man’s voice at the entrance saying who knows what. Jake wondered where the bathrooms were. The idea of attending a sermon dawned again and he wanted to scat. He could find some other way of killing time. Instead, he looked at his feet and avoided gazing at anyone. Why the bloody hell did he come in here? Dummydummydummy. WE CAN BEGIN NOW – shot out and Jake started. What a place to spend the last night of his life. Why was he wasting it here in this rural, rusty, ridiculous place of business. He was supposed to be out in those open fields behind the motel studying the stars one last time. It was a clear night, perfect for a cosmological peep show. He was going to start with the dippers and bears and move on to – NUMBER ONE – Jake jerked again. Damn that cacophonous loudspeaker was indeed loud. A pale man walked up to the stage and gave an awkward wave to the six, seated and waiting. From left to right: Two men, a woman, two men, a woman. The pale man shifted uncomfortably on his feet. The back of his neck beneath his thinning hair looked pale and moist. He ears seemed to reflect his demeanor, drooping with ineptitude. The man on the far left of the stage spoke out with a stentorian voice. “Are you ready?” The pale man nodded. The others onstage nodded. The entrance doors closed. The only doors to the building, Jake realized. “I would like the Chris – “We haven’t gotten that far yet. Please wait a moment.” The pale man looked down and shifted on his feet. The six wrote fiercely on their notepads. “OK.” The first of six said,“You may begin.” Pale man said, “Like I was saying, I want the Christian one.” “Number one, Christianity is a specific religion, a personal matter of faith, and therefore a complete irrelevancy. If you are Christian minded then whatever you choose will, of course be Christian. Perception is reality, sir. You may begin.” “I just thought I should ask. It wouldn’t be right if I didn’t. That’s what I think. Anyway... I want a farm.” The six looked thoughtfully at him, waiting. “You know, just a plain old cattle farm. Lots of land. Good grazing. No diseases. Good weather. That’s about it.” “Will you be alone?” The pale man thought for a long moment and then answered, “Yes.” One of six wrote on the tablet of paper and then handed it to the pale man. As he was reading it the other five people wrote on tablets and then tore loose the paper upon which they had written. The pale man looked up from the paper he was reading. “That’s pretty much it.” Two out of six handed over a piece of paper and pale man read it. “Wow, that’s not bad.” This procedure followed for the rest of the members, each of the remaining receiving less enthusiasm by pale man. One of six said, “Have you made a decision?” “Yes sir. I like yours, but I like the second one better.” Two of six stood from his chair and shook pale man’s hand. He waved him to the rear of the stage and pale man followed his gesture. After turning the rear corner, he began shrinking. Jake stared. Pale man was definitely getting shorter. Oh my God. Jake watched as the pale man continued to shrink as he walked forward. Jake suddenly realized the man was descending stairs hidden from view. How did he know – NUMBER TWO. A teenage girl approached the six. She was wearing a tight t-shirt and loose jeans. She had long auburn hair that seemed unkempt. Or was that an expensive style? The first of six said, “You may begin.” The girl leaned on her right leg, right arm akimbo. Her head was tilted to the left. She seemed vulnerable and defiant. “I want a fast car and an endless highway. I want to meet people along the way. No cops, no government, no rules. I want an endless road trip. I’m not saying everyone I meet has to be cool or good or whatever. Just not boring.” The girl thought a moment. “I also want to be able to fly.” “A few minutes please,” said one of six. The members wrote quickly on their tablets. The girl’s posture had not changed a millimeter. What in hell is this? thought Jake. I’m in some damned theatrical act. That’s got to be it. Jesus H. The six handed her their papers in tandem and down the line she responded: “That’s not it at all. That’s okay. Sucks. Sucks. Not bad. Awesome” Six of six rose and shook the girl’s hand. The girl vanished down the stairs. NUMBER THREE. Jake couldn’t believe it. What a strange theatre. Was this some sampling of the avant-garde out in BFE of the USA? It’s not bad. But God, it’s weird. Jake looked down at the ticket he bought, hoping to find a title or cast list or something. All it had printed was 22. An old man crept up to the stage, obviously in pain. Jake couldn’t tell if it was his knees or hips or back or all. The first of six said, “You may begin.” The old man responded at once. “I want my body back from when I was in my thirties, I want to be rich, and I want to bang a lot. A hell of a lot. The hell with everything else.” The same procedure followed. The old man took the paper from one of six and read it cursorily. “I’ll take it.” One of six rose to shake the old man’s hand. The old man did not extend his hand, but instead spat out, “Choke on it.” The members patiently waited the extra amount of time for the old man to descend the stairs before... NUMBER FOUR. No one responded. Jake looked around the auction house, for the first time really taking in the details. There were wooden bleachers running along the left side and right side of the building. They had once been painted white, but the paint was all but flaked away. A total of eight hanging pendant lights with wide rusty shades hung from the ceiling, a row of four over the length of each set of bleachers. Two lights hung over the front stage area. The overhead illumination had the effect of blackening the eyes and casting hard shadows the cheeks. A few people in the audience were looking around as well. No number four seemed to be responding. NUMBER FIVE. A woman in a yellow print dress approached and stood timidly before the members. The first of six said, “You may begin.” “I... I just want... I want what I have now, but I want it to be... clean, you know? I want clean water and air and clean food. I want my child, my youngest, to be healthy and happy.” Her voice was breaking. “Are you bringing your oldest child with you?” asked one of six. “No! No, he’s staying. I couldn’t... my baby just hasn’t been the same since...” The six prepared their papers. The woman read the first one. She shook her head and was silent. She did this five more times. “None of these are right. You see, I want the same... You don’t understand. After the shots...” The first of six asked, “Which offer do you accept?” “I don’t want any of these; they’re not right. I don’t...” At the front of the building, Jake noticed one of the doors opening and the ticket man with the extraordinary voice and middle aged polish strode into the auction house, directly toward the stage. “I’m trying to tell... I don’t want this anymore. Everything important is gone. How can I keep on...” The ticket man punched the woman in the back of the neck. A nauseating thunk reported through the building. Jake gasped. Some of the others in the audience groaned. No one moved. The woman crumpled to the dirt floor immediately, rustling a diaphanous haze of dust. The ticket man grasped one of her twitching ankles and unceremoniously dragged her out of the building. Near the entrance Jake could see blood around the woman’s mouth and nostrils now caked with dirt. Her dress, which had been riding higher along her body, finally covered her face as she was dragged out of the entrance. She was wearing red polka-dot panties. “As a reminder,” the first of six called out to the audience, “We are not psychiatrists with happy pills, we do not dole out free advice.” Goddamned red polka-dots. “We are not here to fix lives.” Urine soaked red polka-dots. “Once you approach us and offers have been made, it’s too late.” Oh my Christ. One of six had bellowed his statement with the countenance of a middle manager announcing corporate demands for higher productivity. A touch of petulance colored his equanimity, like the rust upon the auction sign. Jake was desperate to leave, but had no idea how. Was it safe? He felt like he was going to vomit and piss his pants at the same time. A woman on a bottom bleacher below Jake slid onto the ground. The man who was sitting next to her hastily picked her up and clutched her next to him, her head slumping forward. The first of six waved his hand and the door closed abruptly, the sound hammering the inside of the building. NUMBER SIX. No one responded. A moment passed. NUMBER SEVEN. No response. Jake thought he recognized that crackling voice over the intercom. Of course. The ticket man. The garbled effect of the old speakers had tarnished his voice, but it was unmistakable. Where the hell was he? What did he do with that woman? NUMBER EIGHT. NUMBER EIGHT. The first of six said, “Let’s take a short recess. Remember the refreshments outside.” The members stood and left the stage. They descended the stairs in the rear. The front doors swung open and were latched into place by the ticket man. He smiled at the audience. Astonishingly, no one rushed out. People began rising and working their way to the front. At least half remained seated, hunched over on their seats, some sipping drinks from paper cups. Jake stepped down the bleacher seats rather than return to the middle stairway. His knees were buckling and he was afraid he would fall. He reached the ground and tried not to bolt for the door. He could feel the gaze of the ticket man on him like a hot oven’s breath. He fancied seeing a crematory oven with rusted bars for teeth clambering after him. The air was cool outside. Another wave of nausea struck Jake. He hurried around the side of the building, into the shadows, and retched. He wiped his mouth and running nose with a shaky hand and wiped it on the leg of his jeans. He heard approaching footsteps. “Are you feeling quite alright?” asked the ticket man. Jake could see the grounds gate over the ticket man’s shoulder. It was chained. A few cars drove by on the highway beyond, headlights gleaming with freedom. The ticket man looked over his shoulder and then back at Jake, providing an oily smile with perfect teeth. “Sorry, there’s no leaving once the auction begins.” “What the hell auction?” Jake shot back. He took a step back without thinking. “I don’t know what this is, but I’m leaving right now.” Jake tramped to his right, intending to swing (with a wide berth) around the ticket man, but his exit was cut off. “Not enjoying the auction?” “What the fu- “ “You didn’t stumble in here by accident,” the ticket man said. “People with death on their minds usually find an auction. Or it finds them.” Jake’s head was swimming. “Most people don’t accept bids their first time. I suggest you do the same. Just watch and keep quiet. You don’t have to decide right now.” “Decide what?” Jake’s voice was hoarse. “Your eternity,” the ticket man said. “You have given it some thought, haven’t you? I did notice you have your death mask on.” Jake stared at him. The ticket man’s shoulders were very thick. “Perhaps you spent more time on how you were going to snuff it rather than on what happens next. It’s an understandable mistake.” The ticket man put a meaty hand on Jake’s shoulder. Jake was surprised to feel a sob well up. Jesus H. He just watched this man kill (didn’t he?) a woman in this nightmarish place and he was actually responding to his fulsome comfort. His euphonic voice sluiced though the spine like some tingling serpent, rendering a pleasant somnolence in the mind and weakness in the extremities. It was an ineffable quality possessed by few, Jake had found. He remembered his third grade teacher had that same gifted inflection. “I suggest you just go back and try to enjoy the rest of the auction.” Jake was allowing himself to be led back into the building, the back of his neck and scalp still tingling pleasantly. What choice did he have? He didn’t have the strength to fight this dude. “Who are they?” Jake heard himself ask. “They’re just bidders, they... well...” The ticket man actually rubbed his forehead in thought. “It’s probably easier if you think of them as Gods.” The ticket man patted Jake on the back and hurried over to another man, addressing him as “Sam.” Were there people who came to this damned thing regularly? Like some damned show. He thought of the race fans that people joke about who seem drawn more to the crashes than the competition. Why the hell am I going back in there? Jake wondered as he reentered the building. Jake took the same seat he had earlier. Most of the attendees had remained seated, seemingly veterans of these auctions. Jake was pretty sure he was the last one to buy a ticket or close to it, yet there were nearly fifty people here. He felt growing animosity for these ghouls. What sort of demented satisfaction - The sound of the doors closing reverberated. NUMBER NINE. # Jake knew his marriage was over by the time his wife, Sue, was seven months pregnant. Both of them knew that she wanted the baby more than him, but Jake was determined to do his best for their child. As she grew more and more devoted to maternal affairs and nesting, Jake felt himself more and more scared and powerless to contribute. He had no idea how to be a Dad. His own father didn’t have a clue. She responded to the distance between them by not responding. By the time she miscarried, the chasm was too great to bridge. They avoided each other and rarely spoke. They couldn’t even find the initiative to divorce or file for separation. As he reflected on it, Jake was glad because she would still be the beneficiary of his life insurance, not to mention his 401k. With additional deductions taken out of his paychecks, she stood to make about a cool half million. Did they yank taxes out of it? Jake wanted his death to happen out of town. He had driven himself into the position of regional manager, following a collegue’s resignation (I’m going to have a baby!), to get on the road and manage different offices in the region. Jake had been doing constant traveling to the thirteen drug stores in his region to provide training on Medicare updates in the pharmacies. A month ago, as he was near his destination, he passed through a small town, the name of which captured his attention. Public. There was something damned peculiar and engaging about a small town named, Public. As he continued into the city, a mere eleven miles ahead, he knew he would die there. He remembered laughing aloud and then crying with relief. Later, during a long meeting with a manager and two assistants, he kept thinking of the inevitable sort of postcards that could be sent from such a small town. I slept in Public. I made love in Public. I took a dump in Public. How about: I died in Public. By the time he was due back a month later, he had arranged everything. It’s astonishing who you can run into at the gym. A year previous, he had met a pharmacist from a competitor’s store who claimed he knew a hit man. Jake still had the man’s phone number, but could not remember why he had saved it. The pharmacist remembered him and hooked him up. All without a prescription. He spoke to an elder sounding woman who collated the logistics, procured a referral, and called him back to confirm the location and date. She made sure Jake sent a current photograph and personal statistics. She was a dutiful secretary, more of a dispatcher for hit men. Jake felt as though he had arranged to have his air conditioner repaired. Jake was to be the victim of a robbery at the motel. He told his office he would be spending the night in Public to save money on motel rates out of the city. His room was to be broken into at approximately 4:00 am. He was going to be shot. Jake specified that he be shot in the heart. He would have the cash with him. Thank God the hit man was cheap. # NUMBER NINETEEN. Jake looked up with a start. A man with a little girl, probably four or five, was approaching the stage. Behind them on the bleachers a woman held her head in her hands and wept. The first of six said, “You may begin.” The man was holding the girl in his arms, her thin, pale legs dangled. She had a pretty dress on and her hair was pony-tailed. Her mother must have spent some time preparing her for the evening. “She has cancer,” the man said. “She been fighting very hard but it’s going to take her soon.” His voice was breaking, but he carried on. “I want her to grow up like she had never been sick. I want her to know what life can be like... without all that pain.” He kissed his daughter’s head, tears gleaming on his cheek, Jake saw. The man read the notes silently, not responding. His wife was watching them, one hand over her mouth. The man stood there several minutes. He kissed his daughter’s head and then stepped forward to shake the hand of three out of six. His wife cried out and tried to stand, but couldn’t. The man walked back to the bleachers. His wife found the strength to stand and she threw her arms around her daughter and kissed her. Three out of six, stepped down from the stage and held out her arm, a quaint smile breaking on her lips. The father sat his girl down on the ground, her legs quaking. Three out of six took the girl’s hand and began leading her behind the stage. The girl cried out and tried to pull away from the woman but couldn’t. “Mama!Daddy!Mama!Daddy!” she screamed, her face turning red and wrenched with terror. The woman dragged her behind the stage, hurrying. The father and mother held each other tightly and dared not look at their daughter. One of the girl’s shoes came off on a clump of grass. The mother’s lips were moving. When the screams of the child abated, Jake heard the constant murmur of ohmygodohmygodohmygod....like some desperate mantra. NUMBER TWENTY. The mother and father were still standing there. No one responded. NUMBER TWENTY-ONE. Three of six returned to the stage. Jake had no idea what he was going to do... Then the ticket man’s words returned to him. Just watch and keep quiet. NUMBER TWENTY-TWO. Jake didn’t dare move. He looked down and watched his hands tear the ticket in half, then quarters. He watched the pieces drift down below the bleachers. What the hell would he wish for anyway? Was this shit even real? God damn it. The six stood together and left the stage, disappearing down the stairs behind it. The front doors swung open and the ticket man latched them to the walls. People began milling out. No one offered help or condolences of any kind to the man and woman still clutching each other in front of the stage. When Jake stepped through the front doors, he could see that the gate was now unlocked. He heard engines start and saw cars trundle by on their way out to the highway. Jake imagined these people hurrying home to watch the latest “reality” show on TV featuring the latest cache of losers to humiliate themselves on a global scale. Jake tripped in a depression in the earth and then made for the gate. He turned right on the sidewalk. His motel was five blocks down. He forced himself to think about a short walk into the field to watch the night sky, the constellations, one more time. It was getting late and only four cars breezed past Jake before he walked into the parking lot of the motel. He walked around the building, hoping no one would see him, and crept out into the dark field. It was chilly and he could see his breath, short and frequent puffs of smoke. He felt intoxicated and dropped down on the ground sitting cross-legged. His head hung and his hands clutched at each other. He thought of the bidders. Just think of them as Gods. Wasn’t that how one could view anyone in power? When does the commerce end? Wasn’t it supposed to end before the afterlife? Even souls were a commodity. How many auctions like this go on? he wondered. What was the catch when you sell your soul to the highest bidder? Or in this case, the most inviting one. Did it last a day and then end? Was it some cosmic sick joke like an episode of The Twilight Zone? The bidders were just business people at the next level. Maybe they were more like a group of pharmaceutical drug reps. Jake smiled. That’s precisely how they looked. Here, buy this drug, it’ll lower your cholesterol, but destroy your liver in the process. They weren’t selling, though; they were buying. Was there really a difference between greedy people on either side of the commercial coin grasping and clutching for what they want? Commerce and corruption. Commerce and corruption. The two were as inseparable as they were ubiquitous. Why does it have to leave this earth with our souls? If one researched, Jake thought, one would find that behind every awful thing, from unfair insurance to poisoned food to deadly prescription drugs to assassinations to false flag terrorist events it was always about a select few people, the global elite, making giant money. It, ultimately, was always about greed. When does it stop? Jake looked up at the sky and saw the stars. No matter how hard he tried he could not focus on any group of them. Commerce and corruption. Jake checked his watch. It was half past two. His heart began pounding again. He thought of the visitor he would get at four. Should he be comforted in knowing precisely when and how he was going to die or should he be wondering if it was a horrible mistake? Why should it matter now? He had already decreed his life worthless. Of course, one man’s trash... Jake was back in the warmth of his motel room, the musty smell almost welcoming. Who gets his soul if he doesn’t auction it? Did someone auction it for him. Was there a God who accepted you into his graceful hands when you kicked the bucket? Were these people tonight cheating God or was God in fact some Mafioso patriarch. Was he in fact Mark Twain’s “malign thug?” Is it just more commerce and corruption? Where there is want, a market follows. Like needing a hit man for instance. Jake took the .357 Magnum from a sock in his suitcase and loaded it with the six bullets he had brought along. It was going to be the hit man’s when he left. It was once his father’s gun. It was part of his late father’s estate, passed especially to him. A gift. The man was as loving as those damned bidders back there. He made a meager living for his family and got drunk when he didn’t have to work. At least he did that much. Jake had spent years wondering if his inability to communicate (with Sue) was because of what he learned from his father. He had spoken to a psychiatrist over it, taken meds over it. Commerce and corruption. There’s a lot of money to be made from pain: mental, physical, metaphysical... The thought struck him like lightning. I could have controlled not only my death, but my afterlife as well. Why should he miss out? ...an understandable mistake. He had missed out all of his thirty-five years on this earth, why should he miss out in the after world? Both life and death had a simple price. He could buy some Godhood with a quick sale. You want a soul that bad? Here’s one! Jake left his room and hurried past the pool and out to the sidewalk. As he rushed back to the auction house, Jake allowed some hope to filter through. The bidders may still be there. If they weren’t he could stay there until they came back. He knew precisely what he wanted. Astronaut. He could spend eternity searching through the cosmos seeing all the wonders he could only imagine before. How many nights had he spent staring at the stars and wishing he could get out there, get out there and be free, get away from all the bullshit. Get out there with the logic and beauty of the infinite. Jake tried not to break into a run for fear of someone calling the cops after him. The gate was still open. The front doors to the building were open. The lights were off. Jake lurched into the yard. Why couldn’t he think of this desire before? You spent more time on how you were going to snuff it rather than on what happens next. Why did he listen to the ticket man? He shouldn’t have let him stop him. He should have been thinking about his auction. Maybe he would have thought of the astronaut thing. It all happened too fast, damn it. He could have escaped right then. He could have proof of death left in this world for the sake of his wife and met up with a dream in which to spend eternity. His soul? Somebody had to take it. It’s up for grabs. Why should he lose out again because of his ignorance of afterlife economics. He knew what to do now. Jake slowed when he got to the entrance to the auction house. It was dark. He could just make out the stage in the rear and started after it. He held his hands out in case he tripped. Once at the stage he felt his way around to the rear. He moved very slowly now. He didn’t want to fall down the stairs and break his neck before he could make a deal for his soul. Jake tapped the ground with his right foot and moved forward a few inches, repeating the procedure. Was it a bad omen the stairs led down? Where the hell was the stairs? The ground was black to him but his eyes had adjusted enough to make out the rear wall. He tapped around with his feet, moving just behind the stage and then turning and moving slightly towards the wall. Come on. All he could feel was earth. Jake dropped to the ground and began grabbing at the earth with his hands. He crawled along moving from the stage to the rear wall, back and forth as though he were a lawn mower covering the ground. “Where are you,” he cried out. “Come on!” He panted on the dust his hands and knees were kicking up and began coughing. He didn’t know if there were tears in his eyes before he started coughing. “Come on, dammit! I’m ready! I’m ready!” The earth smelled moldy and dank. Jake began rolling around on the ground. “Where’s the stairs! Where are you, you bastards” Jake clawed at the dirt and spit. “My soul ain’t good enough for you?” Jake stopped and rolled onto his back. His eyes were closed and his breathing labored. He tasted the dirt. He could feel it caking into mud with his sweat. “Fuck you,” Jake said. “Fuck you and fuck you again.” His mind was whirling and a burgeoning headache throbbed at his temples. “Fuck me, too.” A moment later he got up and left. # As he walked back to the motel, the highway deserted now, Jake tried to summon the enthusiasm he once had for his planned death. For the first time in months he had felt a spark of hope. Hope for what? It wasn’t for life; he had long since abandoned life. Jake was surprised to find himself struggling to remember why he had given up. It had become a habit lately, a given. He had missed his chance to find happiness in the afterlife. Maybe. Maybe there was still hope. Maybe there was another chance to barter with his soul. If there were enough screw ups like him, there had to be a market. Three sodium vapor lights cast a pall of ashen green light over the parking lot of the motel. Jake thought his car looked miserable sitting there all alone. He imagined getting in the car and leaving, driving... where? It was nearly four a.m. now. Jake forced himself to remember his original plan. He cleaned his dirty clothes in the tub and put them in a bag by his suitcase. He showered and dried his hair. He laid the gun on the circular table near the door. He put the envelope filled with cash next to the gun. When the hit man came in he wouldn’t have to search for it. If fact they wouldn’t have to say a word to each other. That would be much better. With no intention of sleeping, Jake got into bed, pulled up the sheets, and switched off the light. He was supposed to be surprised by a burglar; he couldn’t very well be hanging out at the table sipping a drink or jerking off for that matter. Was he breaking protocol by not jerking off in a cheap motel room? He watched the beam of streetlight coming in between the curtains. Jake thought of Sue. She could finally take a holiday in Europe as she had always dreamed. She could do something with the money. She couldn’t do anything with him. Wasn’t there something noble about dying for your woman? He felt tears welling up in the corners of his eyes. No way, absolutely no way. Suck it up, you bastard. It’s too late now. You are not going to cry for yourself. No one gave a shit before, why should you care now? But, some part of him did care. Maybe when he got to the next world, he could try to do a better job than the one he did in this one. He checked the digital alarm clock by the bed. 4:06. Jake felt panic seize him. He should get up. Get up and get out now. Go! Run bare-assed out to the car and goooooo! It’s not too late. A shadow broke the light coming in from between the curtains. A second later Jake heard scratching sounds on the doorknob. He could feel blood pounding at his temples, his heart was hammering. Too late. A bead of sweat rolled into his ear. This is what he had planned and created, controlled. Was it really that different from being a child led into a nurse’s station to receive a terrifying shot? It’s good for you, sweetie. The door burst ajar. Stopped. Then slowly swung all the way open. The light from the parking lot was sufficient to see the man’s face. Jake chortled. Of course it was him. It shouldn’t have been anyone else. Jake was giggling and crying. He closed his eyes and felt the tears streaming down his face, tasted the salty taste at the corner of his mouth. Commerce and corruption. Please... Commerce and corruption, again. Talk to me. Just a few moments. I’ve got two dollars. The pistol was now in the shadow of a large, but delicate hand. The ticket man swung the door closed behind him.

Danny Burnham Michael Henson “I thought you had it in the back.” Alan Mabry had just watched Danny Burnham hoist a five-gallon bucket of paint off the tailgate of a pickup truck. Danny Burnham was a red-faced block of a man with a graying red mustache. He paused a moment, then slung the bucket up three steps and through the stone-linteled doorway of a row-house apartment building. “Therapy, my brother,” said Danny Burnham. “They teach you how to lift in therapy. What about you?” “I never got no therapy,” Alan Mabry said. “Just pills.” He was a taller man, angular and spare. He pulled a second bucket of paint from the truck and lugged it up the steps and through the door. A woman picked up a tool box from the truck and followed. She was as broad-shouldered as Danny Burnham and she wore work boots and coveralls. She set the toolbox down and went back to the truck without a glance at either of the men. “They give me the pills too,” said Danny Burnham. He had gone a little redder in the face and his voice had just a touch of a wheeze to it now. “But I’m trying to stay off the motherfuckers.” He slung a bucket of drywall mud off the truck and up the steps and through the door. “Oxys? “Oxy-motherfuckin-Contin. They’ll mess with your head and they’ll break your heart. They’ll tell you sweet stories, then they’ll kick you when you’re down.” “I don’t much care for pills myself,” Alan Mabry said. “I throwed mine down the toilet.” Danny Burnham twitched his mustache and arched a brow. And if he meant to say something, he thought better of it. The woman stood now in the bed of the truck. “Hand me that drill set,” Danny Burnham said to her. Silently, the three emptied the truck of tools, lumber, pipe, and other supplies into the building. “What else you gonna need?” Alan Mabry asked. “A couple brooms. A mop, a mop bucket. Some Spic and Span. A mattress to sleep on.” “It’s a mess,” Alan Mabry said. The building had long stood empty. Every word, every step echoed. An odor of piss and broken plaster rose around them. “You sure you want to stay here?” “We got nothing else,” Danny Burnham said. “Not now.” He glanced toward the woman with his twitch and arch, but she had pulled out a cigarette. She concentrated very hard on the lighting of her cigarette and inhaled long and deep. “It ain’t much,” Alan Mabry said. “We’ve seen worse. Haven’t we?” Danny Burnham glanced again to the woman, but she looked away and exhaled long and slow. “We’ve seen worse,” Danny Burnham said again. “Me and her can knock this out in about a week or two. That’ll just about get us back on our feet.” Alan Mabry looked through the room to a back window where a plywood board had been pried loose. “They done stripped every bit of copper pipe out of here.” “Well, then, that’s where we’ll start.” “You still got electric.” “Good, you got a little hot plate or a microwave we can use?” Alan Mabry nodded. “I’ll have em cut the water back on in the morning. I don’t know what you’ll do for a toilet til then.” “We got a bucket.” Alan Mabry nodded. “Like I say, we’ve seen worse.” “Come around to the Paradise in the morning. I’ll have Donna make you breakfast.” Danny Burnham nodded thanks. He looked around at the bare walls, the fireplace with the mantle stripped away, the wallpaper stained and split, and asked, “How much did you pay for this?” “An arm and a leg and a pint of blood.” * The woman watched Alan Mabry drive away in his pickup truck. Then she asked, “What the hell have you got us into now?” “I got us into some money.” “It don’t look like money to me.” “I’m telling you, I got us into some money.” “You got us into some pissy-smellin pit of nothing.” “At least we got a roof over our heads.” “But no water. What the hell was you thinking of when you stole all the copper out of here?” “I was thinking, I’ll get paid on both ends. Once for sellin the copper out and once for puttin it back in.” The woman looked away. She folded her arms and stared down the street. “You’re a scheming son-of-a-bitch.” “I schemed us a place to sleep for the night. Hell, we slept the last three nights in the car.” “Which we don’t have no more.” “That’s okay, babe,” he said. “I got a plan to turn this around.” * “Not bad for two days work. What do you think?” Two days, and there was now a working kitchen and a bedroom with a mattress in each corner — a small one in one corner and a larger one in the other — and a television set up on a milk crate. “I think you’ll do better without that boy,” Alan Mabry said. The boy was in the back yard working a hand saw against a two-by-four. He was sixteen or eighteen, shirtless, lean as a ferret. His jeans were slung low on his hips and the tops of his plaid boxers rode high. He was tattooed in several places on his chest and arms in no seeming pattern. “That boy,” said Danny Burnham, “has helped us sweat the pipes back in, get the water back on, and the first floor cleaned up to where you could just about live in it.” Alan Mabry had to admit, “It don’t look bad.” The smell of urine was gone and replaced by a smell of cleaning fluid and fresh paint. The boy cut through his board and it clattered to the ground. He picked it up, eyed it, and came with it into the kitchen. “Wassup, Alan,” the boy said, “What’s up, Tommy.” Alan Mabry looked away quickly. The boy passed through the kitchen and went up the stairs. Alan Mabry surveyed the room again. A toolbox stood open near the door. He stopped and looked. “Where did you get your stud finder?” “I’ve had it for years,” Danny Burnham called from the next room. Alan Mabry glanced toward the stairs where the boy had gone. He shook his head and gestured Danny Burnham to come closer. “Whatever you’re payin that boy,” he said, “comes out of your cut.” “Well, I . . . .” “I hired you and I hired your woman. I didn’t hire nobody else. I ain’t payin nothing extra for Tommy Perdue.” “All right. All right. He’s strictly on my dime.” “And I never said nobody else could stay here.” “Is that a problem?” “I don’t want him here.” “Why in the hell are you goin off on me all of a sudden?” “Cause you let that little weasel of a boy stay here.” “And what’s the problem with that boy?” “He’s a damn thief and a snake. And I don’t want him in my building.” “If I’m rentin this place . . .” “Which you’re not.” “It’s the same thing.” “Then show me your lease.” “You hired me to fix this place up and I’m fixin this place up and this boy is helping me get it done.” “But that ain’t the agreement we had.” “Fuck your agreement and fuck you. Fuck you and fuck this building. Fuck you six times crosseyed.” He would have said more, but the woman cut in. “Danny, hush,” she said. ‘It’s his building. He can do what he wants with his building. He give us this place to stay and he give us the job, so hear the man out.” Danny Burnham stared away. He jammed his hands into his pockets and he stared out the window to the alley behind. Alan Mabry looked the other direction. “Let him stay,” he said. “He don’t have to stay. I can send him on.” “I said, he can stay.” “I’ll tell him, pack up your shit and go. He don’t have that much, so it won’t take long.” “Goddamit, he can stay.” “Danny,” the woman cut in. “He said he can stay.” Danny Burnham nodded. He twitched his mustache and nodded again. “You two been arguing like this for years,” the woman said. “Let him stay, but whatever he steals is on you.” “I’ll watch him like a hawk,” Danny Burnham said. “I’ll be on him like white on rice.” * “Now I’m gonna show you how to get this right,” said Danny Burnham. He pointed to a length of two-by-four and Tommy Perdue brought it to him and laid it across the saw horses. The woman interrupted from the doorway. “I’m goin to work,” she said. She was in the uniform of a fast food restaurant. Danny Burnham twitched his mustache and said nothing. “Did you hear me?” “I heard you.” “Well, I’m goin to work.” Danny took a tape measure, put the tag on one end of the two-by-four, and stretched the tape out to thirty-seven inches. It hurt him in the small of the back just to bend over, but he said nothing about it. “Somebody’s got to bring in some money here.” “I told you, I got this covered.” He marked his spot with a pencil, then motioned toward the tool box. Tommy Perdue pointed to a level, a stud finder, and a chalk line before he came to the square. “It’s been four days and we ain’t seen but a few dollars.” “You get paid when you finish the job, that’s how it works.” “And how are we supposed to eat until then? I could have used your help.” “Not now you don’t. You got Tommy.” He turned toward her — carefully, for it hurt to turn — and he raised his brow and twitched his mustache. “I got to go,” she said. He nodded and turned back to the two-by-four. “Let me show you,” he said, “how to make that cut.” With the square and pencil, he drew a straight cut line across the board. Then, with an eye to see if Tommy Perdue was watching, he set the saw to the line and cut. But it hurt his back to bend in the cutting position, so he handed the saw to the boy. “You’re gonna have to finish this for me,” he said. He handed off the saw, stepped away, and put his hands to the small of his back to try to rub out the pain. He watched Tommy skip and skitter the saw over the board, then proceed to cut aslant of the line. “Is that all right?” Danny Burnham nodded. He was wordless with pain. It’s all right, he thought. It’s as good as it’s gonna get. * “You said you’re payin him, but I ain’t seen you give him any more than a buck or two to get him a sandwich.” The woman still wore her fast food uniform. “They treatin you all right so far?” She shrugged. “I mean, you could ask Alan for a job over in the Paradise. I could say something to him” She shook her head. “Never,” she said. “Not if I was starving.’ Danny Burnham shrugged this time. He looked away. “I asked you, how are you payin that boy?” “I got him covered.” “Alan Mabry’s nickel and dimed you for a week now, so how you gonna pay this boy?” “Alan Mabry is a tight-fist miser-ass son of a bitch, but he’ll pay what he owes.” “You wouldn’t need a boy to help you if you hadn’t gone and showed off that first day.” Danny Burnham chewed on his mustache for a moment. “Slingin five gallon paint buckets like they was nothing.” “It hurts like a motherfucker,” he said. “So how you payin this boy?” “I already paid him.” “With what? Your good looks?” “You remember they give me a scrip for Oxy when I tore up my back?” “You said you wasn’t gonna take em.” “And I ain’t gonna take em.” He nodded for emphasis. “But I filled the scrip.” “You’re feedin that boy those Oxys?” “One a day. Just enough to keep him from getting drug sick.” “You’re working that boy for an Oxy a day?” “What if I paid him a hundred dollars a day? Do you know what he’d do?” “How can you do that?” “You and I both know he’d go straight out and blow it all on Oxys.” “I can’t believe you’re payin him one a day.” “And then he’d probably overdose hisself.” “You’re workin that boy like a dog for an Oxy and a baloney sandwich?” “And a place to sleep.” “And a place to sleep.” “Nobody else would take him. His own mother’s put him out.” “An Oxy and a baloney sandwich and a place to sleep. And Alan Mabry pays for the baloney sandwich and the place to sleep.” “And the insurance paid for the Oxys. I tell you, babe, I got this figured out.” The woman shook her head. She took out her pack and hammered out a cigarette and lit it and shook her head. “You’re a scheming motherfucker,” she said. “You’re a scheming mother fucker.” * Slowly, the pain in his back unraveled and Danny Burnham thought he could sleep. It was long past midnight and the city was silent but for a distant siren and a drift of music from a house down the street. The lights were out at the Paradise CafÉ and in most of the houses around him. Cheryl, his woman, lay asleep on the mattress in one corner of the room and Tommy Perdue lay passed out on the smaller mattress in the other. The woman murmured and grumbled in her sleep and the boy wheezed and twitched and between the two of them was the throbbing in his back, Danny Burnham could not settle down. As ever, the pain had worried him awake and left him nauseous. As ever, he thought about the pills. If he just took the pills, it would all go away. But he had a better plan for the pills. Instead, he pulled out his bag and his papers, rolled a nice fat joint, and smoked. Slowly, the pain unraveled and he could think. He thought about the work he had done that day and the work he had yet to do tomorrow. All that work, and not a single good word from Alan Mabry. That son-of-a-bitch Alan Mabry. He silently cursed Alan Mabry until he had cursed him out of mind. The pain had unraveled and the world had backed up. He sucked down the last of the joint, got up from the stoop, went in the house, and crawled back into his bed. The woman next to him continued to hum and grumble in her sleep, but that would not bother him now. The pain had unraveled and he had thought out everything he needed to think out and he was ready to sleep. But the boy had continued to wheeze and to twitch. It’s the asthma, Danny thought and he tried to sleep through it. He had slept through it before. But there was something wrong this time to the rhythm of it and when Danny listened closer there was a cackle in the boy’s breath that should not be there. He wheezed and twitched and cackled like a man close to drowning and Danny Burnham was worried out of sleep all over again. The Oxys should have knocked him out, Danny Burnham thought. They should have settled him right down. He should be sleepin like a baby. He walked to the boy’s side and stood, weed-fuddled and wobbling, and listened. Wheeze and cackle, wheeze and twitch, wheeze and cackle. There was surely something wrong. The woman must have sensed it. She came over, rubbing her eyes and cursing softly. “What’s the matter?” she asked. “What’s goin on?” “Run down to the firehouse,” he said. He knelt down and touched the boy’s brow. “This little motherfucker’s gone and overdosed.” * “And how’s he gonna overdose on one little pill?” The ambulance and the EMTs were gone. The police were gone. Alan Mabry, who had heard about it somehow, had cursed his way down to the house and now he was gone too. The boy’s mother had come in tears and she was gone. Danny Burnham sat on the stoop and tried to figure out an answer. The woman did not wait. “I got to get up in the morning,” she said, and padded off to bed. She threw herself down on the mattress and pulled the covers up over her head. In a moment, she had mumbled herself to sleep. Danny Burnham looked up the street and down one more time, then walked back to the kitchen. He had no idea if the boy would live or die. The police had questioned him hard. Alan Mabry had given him hard looks. And Cheryl had had hard words for him. He was beat-down tired, but his back had begun to throb again. There was no way he could sleep. That boy, he thought, should have been flat out sleepin like a baby. He had gotten hold of more pills somehow. He didn’t know how the boy did it, but he know what the boy did. He wanted to check. He moved a toolbox and looked at the floor beneath it. Everything was where it should be. He’s good, he thought. He knows what he’s doing. He pressed with his toe on the edge of a floorboard and the board came loose. He knelt, reached into the space between the joists and there was the pill bottle, just where he had hidden it. He was surprised to see that it was still there. Surely, if the boy was going to steal, he would have stolen the whole thing. But, just in case, he reached for the bottle and gave it a shake. Empty. It was empty. His back throbbed like a clock. He gripped the empty pill bottle in his fist and it carried him through a wave of nightmare pain that rose, nearly capsized him, broke, and subsided. He wanted to wake her up and tell her, Honey it hurts so bad, but she had that morning shift; he could not bear to wake her. So he gripped the pill bottle and shivered through another wave of pain and cursed his luck. He cursed his luck and Alan Mabry and the boy Tommy Perdue. That scheming little motherfucker, he cursed. That scheming mother fucker.

The Ghost Poet’s Memorial Jesse S. Hanson His grandfather told me to mention once again that we are not here in disrespect for the old traditions. But the family has chosen to remember and to learn more about the life rather than to forget. His grandfather says, “If we forget those who have gone, maybe we will also become reclusive and forget those few of us who are left.” So we are saying his name here and remembering. I have been asked by the family to speak of my experience with him, since I had a certain relationship with him and he was absent from your association for so long. I met Thomas in the Federal Penitentiary. I was very fortunate, in the first year of my graduate work, undertaken en route to my future as a paranormal psychologist, to be part of a research team on a project that was implemented within the mental unit of the prison. There were three of us involved with the project. We were investigating, if I can use that term loosely, the reports of a guru, who was purported to be a truly remarkable personality, having both the qualities of a charismatic and mystic sage on the one hand and those of a mentally disturbed patient/inmate on the other. The relationship of this guru with the other inmates, and the effect that he had upon them, was the focus of our research. Our mutual friend, Thomas, who in the will of the Creator has now left this mortal condition, was one of a very interesting group of fellows who had, not only come to see him as their spiritual leader, but also actually chummed around with this person, within the confines of the prison mental ward. For the purposes of our research, we conducted countless interviews with the inmates. I remember, in one of my first conversations with Thomas, I mentioned to him that I’d recently heard some people claim that Taoism is like Native American philosophy and I asked him what he thought of that notion. Thomas told me, quite bluntly, that there is no Native American philosophy to his knowledge, and that “that’s all a crock of shit”. I didn’t go into it further, but I assumed he meant, no collective Native American philosophy. Nevertheless, Thomas conceded that he could, as he put it, “dig the Tao”. The few short months that I spent with those men in that institution were very painful for me, in coming to terms with certain realities of their lives, but the time was also inspirational and unforgettable. I will tell you, you who are his family, you who are his friends, and you who are friends of his family, and without exaggeration or melodrama, that the memory of Thomas is burnt like a pyrograph into the passageways of my mind. His gaunt, round face with the scarce beard stubble and head-banded hair that stopped short of his shoulders, brought to my mind the photos I’d seen of Geronimo and Cochise and Cochise’s son, Naiche. When I asked Thomas if he would talk about himself, if he would tell me a story about himself, he told me he’d have to think about it. He said there might be something. It was a week later that he came up to me and told me that there was something he’d like to tell. Something from the old days, he said. He asked me to come to his cell so he could tell it in private. I always carried a recorder and with Thomas’s permission I recorded our conversation so I’ll tell it, mostly I’ll read it to you, like it happened. It is noteworthy that Thomas, in speaking about drugs, lumped peyote in with LSD and other hallucinogens. I mention this, because I realize that there are those who could take issue with this sort of lumping, and I want to clarify that it is the way Thomas expressed it, and not something that I have done to manipulate his meaning, or from any agenda of my own. my interview with Thomas Small Ozwald Renewski Thomas begins, “It was a funny thing about drugs in those days. You didn’t so much make a conscious decision to take some drug, you know. It would just be available and like you’d heard of it, but then there it is... and maybe you’d hesitate for a second. But you don’t know nothin about a drug till you take it. Hell, that’s basically the way people smoke their first cigarette, take their first drink, whatever. And you’re never quite the same after. You gain somethin, you lose somethin. It’s just that with some things, it seems like a bigger deal. You take acid, eat peyote, your whole perspective can sure as shit change. A lot of drugs feed on your low tendencies, work on your will power, make you addicted. But acid, peyote, hallucinogens, they blow your mind. You figure out quick that you’ve had everything wrong all your life. Only thing is any new conclusions you come to when you’re on the stuff... Oops, wrong again. You know that what you knew, you don’t know, but you get in deeper when you know you don’t know and cannot know any damn thing at all. You could be wrong about that too, but who the hell knows. You know what I mean, Ozwald?” He puts his hands up, shrugs his shoulders. Smiles an unknowing smile at me, goes on. “In those days I wanted to be a poet. I wanted to express truth and I wanted the life of a poet. Be careful what you want, man. If we ever see any truth in this life, we tend to wish we hadn’t. Life’s a ghost story, I’m afraid. In those days I wanted to be a poet but I became a ghost. You might find something romantic in that. Some fools do. That’s cause they’re still babies, suckin at the world’s tit. Don’t know to be afraid a nuthin. It’s hard to swallow the pill, the idea of things bein bad and not good. All the fools are happy. Happy/sad. Happy/sad. I’d been hanging out on the street just getting to know everybody, sort of. The musicians, the poets and writers, all the artists and the crafts people. The winos and the addicts too. And the bag ladies, everybody. It was a scene. I was livin the life I figured I’d been born for. Hell I’m an Indian, what else should I do. He come up to me after a little gig I did at a health food buffet place. They let you sit up on a little stool in the corner and do your thing. Folksingers and poets. People’d eat, talk, maybe somebody’d pay attention. Maybe somebody’d give ya a tip. Musicians could do pretty good out on the street, but people mostly think you’re crazy if you stand on the corner reciting poetry. I’d seen im around. Seen im walkin with this way pretty maid. Some of the vendors holler’n ‘Hey Bobby’ at him like old pals. Like he knew everybody. Never had no personal communication with him before this time though. He said, ‘You’re pretty good.’ He said ‘You just need ta learn how to talk.’ I wasn’t quite sure what to make of that. He tore off on a rant that sounded pretty much like gibberish to me. I guess it was supposed to be an example of how to talk. At that point another guy I’d met came up and after a minute, he asked us if we wanted to go smoke a joint. We said, “Okay” The whole arrangement of the market was built on the edge of the cliff, following the curve of the bay, behind. Every hundred yards or maybe a little less, there were long wooden flights of stairs going down to the street below. About halfway down the hill we left the stairs to the right and made our way along the hillside to a place between the supports for the railroad bridge that went over the crescent concave of the bay. It was a common place to go for smoking dope I guess and the winos and others used it for passing a bottle around too. But it was just us there at that time. We smoked the dooby as a train went over, which Bobby and I agreed was a kind of rare occurrence but Kim, our Vietnamese friend with the weed said he’d seen them every now and then. About two thirds of the way through the doob, Bobby started off on a poem without any introduction or request from us to hear one or any request from him if we wanted to hear one. He took off out of the gate fast, firing out streams of images and animating with hands and arms and legs. He hit full stride within moments and he would look at you and then turn away or look up at the bridges, or out to the bay. When he’d look at you it was intense and every word burned your consciousness and triggered your memory. I looked at Kim and he was right there too. And some of the words burned like little flicks of a knife that cut the skin and make it bleed and other words hit like hammers of fists that knock you back and take the wind out of you, confuse you and rattle your mind. I think now that he was not doing anything different than the rant he’d started outside the café, but it took either the drug or the situation to open my mind to it. After a timeless period in the hazy vacuum of that space, the poem stopped. We stood there, Bobby sat down on the massive length of concrete that the big steel frame was bolted to. We looked at the bay. We looked around. Silent. The pigeons burbling above. The cars motoring below. Ferry coming in and a big cargo ship just sitting out there. Almost distinguishable voices drifting up from the open restaurants on the street. Bobby said he had to go meet his girlfriend so he left. After he was gone I realized I was overcome, not only with awareness of the realities of Bobby’s words, but sadly, depressingly, I was green jealous. ‘How can I even think about being a poet?’ I blurted out to Kim. ‘What do you mean?’ ‘I mean, I see now what a poet is. I mean, that wasn’t a poem; I’d say that was just straight from his soul. It just poured out of him like out of a freaking prophet or something.’ ‘It was amazing.’ Kim agreed. ‘And me, I agonize over these lines, spend hours, days trying to come up with just the right thing. Maybe come up with a dozen lines. What the hell am I doing. Who am I kidding... that I pretend to be a poet.’ ‘Don’t be so hard on yourself man.’ Kim says to me. ‘ I guess he’s been doing it for a long time.’ Then he adds. ‘I’ve even been writing a few lines myself these days.’ ‘Thanks, I appreciate it. But I still feel discouraged.’ I was on an ego thing you know. And I saw that Bobby, who acted all flamboyant and loud and got the girls and got everybody’s attention probably brought no more ego tripping to it” Thomas makes the sign of quotation marks with his fingers when he says the word it, “than I did. A couple of days later I saw Kim and we went down and burned another one, and he was a dope dealer you know, though he looked like a kid, and he was on acid but he was one of those personalities who could function outwardly like normal. I never could understand that. But Kim is telling me how he feels that LSD is a gift from God and how he wants to spread it around and open people’s eyes and stuff. That sounded pretty good, as I hadn’t really gotten that impression with my limited experience with the stuff. As it went, he gave me a few hits to take with me and spread the word and so I had an opportunity to broaden my horizons once again.” Here Thomas gives me another unknowing look with a little unknowing wink. He asks me to get him a drink, since he doesn’t go near the fountain, for some reason that he doesn’t explain, so I get him one from the fountain in a plastic glass that he keeps on his person. He drinks slowly, long and noisy. Then he’s ready to talk again. “We ate the acid on the bus ride to Bobby’s apartment. There were five of us, including Bobby’s girlfriend who didn’t take any. There was also my friend Garland, who was a transient, originally from Philadelphia, and his friend, Rick Littlefoot, who I didn’t really like. The guy was friendly but he was like into black arts crap and he sure wasn’t somebody I could see chumming up with. I’d met the guy’s ol’ lady once and she gave me the creeps too. About an hour after we got to the apartment, I was so blasted. We were drinking beer and rolling cigarettes and listening to Leonard Cohen but that got old as we’d started trippin so we put on some old blues that was working for us better. It seems like something comes out about a person’s true colors. Well, maybe the truth comes out and maybe it don’t. Maybe it’s all imagination, who the hell knows. After awhile, to me, people start lookin like Gumby and Pokey only not cute. But them black arts people I mentioned, their hard edges and their hard words just seemed to get harder. I was becoming a little overly aware of everybody’s hard edges, I’d say. But you can’t turn back, you know. So as I’d feel ever more sensitive to life and cognizant, I guess you could say, of a miracle of life, at the same time other folks are sharpenin their blades and flexing muscles, wielding their bludgeons. I mean I’m tryin to be a flower child here, and they with their canines dripping as they lift their faces from the belly of the beast. Later, I remember Bobby talking to me and Garland and then Garland is gone and it’s just Bobby and me and it’s like he’s giving me some kind of class or something. But he goes on like explaining to me how the true nature of things are like ghosts and spirits and he’s telling me, ‘This is spiritual’ cause he knows I’m looking for the spiritual. And as things get crazier, it seems like he’s mocking me, ‘This is spiritual’, ‘This is spiritual’. And he’s showing me these scars on his chest and saying how he used to get down when he was into Satanism but now he’s gone back to the Sundance and the old ways, somethin like that. And he’s got this impression of himself, it seems as a poet, as an agent from the dark, come to warn folks, come to show em the reality. Anyway, it must have got to be the middle of the night somehow and everybody seemed to be asleep, but me and Bobby. Or they left, I don’t even remember. Bobby looks like anybody’s incarnation of some beast from hell. He has buffalo horns, huge saber tooth fangs and a face all perverted that you can’t even look at. I figure he’ll probly eat me or worse, but we decide to go out walking around and so we do that. Me and the ‘many colored Beast’, walking downstairs out of a dive apartment in the slums. It’s not just me. It may be acid inspired, but he knows what he is. Lets me know he knows. As morning comes closer, his horns are getting shorter as well as his fangs. His long shaggy hair and mane, gradually turning back into Bobby’s long black hair. But he’s one who rarely ever shuts up. You just want some peace, after being up all night, and you think you’ve had more than enough, but he goes on and on. Bragging about his homemade hooch, harassing his girlfriend, harassing me. After breakfast we hop the bus and go back downtown. He’s got the idea we’re soul mates. Of one mind. I know we’re not, but it feels good somehow, in my delirium, to have a soul mate, though I had never expected it to be the devil, if I did have one. It’s nine o’clock in the morning and there’s drunks stumbling out of the bars, red men, yellow men, white man, black men, whatever color. They get off to a good start down there. And he’s raving away and they’re all in perfect tune and they seem to get every word he says and everybody’s dancin around like their ship just come in. The dance of the winos. Bobby’s the music, he’s in his element.” Thomas seems tired now. I ask him if he is. He says he is. I say ‘We can continue later’. He says, “I aint told ya nothing good yet.” I say ‘That’s a very promising prospect, hearing something good.’ He says, “Well, I wanna tell ya somethin good.” I say, ‘Good.’ Two days later, Thomas approaches me that he wants to go on with his story. I’m glad to hear it. He wants to go into the big room this time, which we do and he leads me to a bench near the back wall. “There probly aint so much more to tell.” he starts out. I find it interesting that someone who spent at least a portion of his life, living the life of a poet, is in the habit of using such poor grammar. At one point I think it made me question the authenticity of his story, but I got over it. He’s looking around, like he’s looking for the words. “There probly aint that much more,” he repeats, “but maybe there’s some more.” I don’t say anything. “I didn’t want anything to do with Bobby after that. I didn’t decide that he was flat out evil or anything. I guess I was convinced that he did see himself as some kind of messenger from hell. That he was serving the people in that capacity, as perverted as it was. But I couldn’t be around him. I sure as hell couldn’t handle it. Somehow, someway, he’d got to me though and I found his way to have a certain romance. I think now that it’s in league with, it’s a similar romance that gullible people have found down through time in hero-worshiping crime figures and cutthroats, like Robin Hood, Jesse James, etc. Bobby wasn’t a criminal, don’t get me wrong on that. He wasn’t out to hurt people. But he took his energy, his zest for his poetry, from the darkness. I do think his intentions were good. But he had nothing to offer. Isn’t that the way? Everybody’s carryin some warning, aint they? Don’t go down this road. Don’t do what I done. But they aint none of em can tell you what road to go down. I killed a man. He was goin ta rob me and he threatened me and I felt threatened and I shot him and I stabbed him over and over. I was pretty freaked out. Self defense, but the law didn’ care. Illegal weapons and excessive use of violence. Also, possession of an illegal substance, namely amphetamine. I’d gone pretty far down the road by that time. I guess my poetry’d taken a pretty dark turn as well. But that was the beginning for me. What seemed like it could be the end was the beginning. Some folks would have us believe that all roads lead to hell. Some would go the other way and say they all lead us home. I don’t know as one’s more true than the other. I was bounced around within the prison system a bit before I got here. Here I met George.” Here Thomas is referring to the prison guru that I mentioned earlier. “All the stuff that went before is only water under the bridge now. I guess George is the real poet. Bobby only seems like a poor troubled kid with a huge ego to me now. I asked George about him. George said to forget about him. I’m okay with that. George has to remember everybody, why should I worry?” Thomas seems to be done with his story at this point and sits, hands on his knees, head down, silent. “Earlier, you referred to yourself as a ghost.” I remind him. “No, no, no, ya got me wrong. I didn’t say I was well. No, I’m a ghost alright. I’ve never got back and I aint comin back. So don’t think you pinned one on me, Ozwald.” he hasn’t raised his voice but his demeanor has suddenly become very severe. I tell him I didn’t mean to pin one on him. He says, “The hell you didn’t.” I say, “Ok, maybe I had some small motivation like that for saying it.” He says, “Damn sure you did... but I forgive you for it.” and with that forgiveness given, he gets up and walks away. I am left to my own conclusions. Ultimately I concluded, or rather I came to the personal theory, that Thomas was convinced that his guru, George, didn’t care whether he was a ghost or a man. Please allow me to read a poem written by Thomas, which he kindly shared with me and gave me permission to copy. wild Indians we’ve run from the old world we’ve show’d no respect for it their god of work their broken spirits their fear of law their stiff upper lips we gave back the poison we had no taste for it the dead food the fine spirits the man made materials the medicine cabinet to the hills we’ve escaped to the stars we’ve flown to the sea from their precious idol, tax and spend from their beloved deity, on vacation from their holy scripture, fire and brimstone from their sacred pilgrimage to vault and casket we’ve turned back the clocks we’ve thrown the clocks to hell it’s all start to finish it’s all live and die it’s all lie to live where all stand to fall we’ve run from the old world we’ve show’d no respect for it their guns and drums their blood and thirst their right to might their going forward curse when the gate was left open we turned and fled oh sun and stone oh flesh and bone oh curse and wailing oh revenge and failing we’ve run on off roads, so deep and rutted we’ve run barefoot and pregnant and crying and mudded we’ve stopped when the old ones are too sick and coughing we’ve stopped when the young ones are vomiting from drinking we’ve stopped to catch our breath when it is bleeding we’ve stopped to bury those who no longer needed breathing we’ve stopped to try and remember our languages and speaking we’ve stopped to try and forget our world that we loved... we’ve stopped to try and see where we were going we’ve stopped to pray for help and showing... we’ve run on blind and unknowing. The poem “wild Indians” was originally published by itself at Bring the Ink Journal. “The Ghost Poet’s Memorial” is an excerpt from the novel manuscript, “Song of George/Portrait of an Unlikely Holy Man” which has just been accepted for publication by All Things That Matter Press.

Jesse S. Hanson bio jesse s. hanson is a North Dakota (rural Midwest USA) native, currently living in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, USA. He and his wife are part-time performing folk/rock musicians in the greater Pittsburgh area. jesse has been a songwriter all his life but has directed the main focus of his attention to the writing of two novels over the last 5 years. His novel manuscript, “Song of George/Portrait of an Unlikely Holy Man”, which is set in the psychiatric unit of a modern Federal Prison, has recently been accepted for publication by All Things That Matter Press. “The Ghost Poet’s Memorial” is excerpted from “Song of George”.

If It Sounds Too Good To Be True.... Timothy N. Stelly Sr. I figured Terri meant for me to make a left instead of a right. I remembered her words before I pulled out of the driveway: Don’t worry, Tom. I went over the map again this morning. Everything’s fine. When she uttered the words, there was a funny simper on her face, but at the time I thought nothing of it. Now if this was her idea of a practical joke, I didn’t find it funny and would tell her as much when I saw her. Then again, she was from the area, so I figured she knew her way around. Though 200 miles seemed a long way to go for an interview as a hotel clerk, the job offered not only a $65,000-a-year salary, but medical, dental and eye care benefits, plus a paid-for two-bedroom apartment. I admit, however, that I was frustrated not only because I’d fallen behind schedule and was growing sleepy, but at Terri’s supposed inattentiveness. The crudely drawn map she made for me led to this desolate area where nary a car passed in the other direction. For an hour I traveled east non-stop, until the sky was but a vast indigo blanket. I drove along a two-lane road lit only by the headlights of my station wagon. It was unfamiliar territory and after midnight, so it was doubtful that there would be a business open where I might stop and ask for directions. All I knew about this barren area was that it was called Trout Creek, and the freeway was some forty miles behind me, somewhere among the twisting, unlighted road. My eyes grew heavy as I peered at line after line of seemingly endless asphalt. The only thing keeping me awake was the occasional sighting of the animal carcasses that littered the roadside, bones bleached white by months spent in the merciless desert sun. After another five minutes of traveling, I considered pulling over on the shoulder of the road and catching a few winks; but that darkness – that endless sheet of ebony mystery – wouldn’t allow it. Perhaps viewing too many horror films like The Hills Have Eyes had pushed my fear to extreme levels. No, stopping was definitely out of the question. That’s when I saw the sign, It appeared like a desert mirage, out of nowhere, a tattered sign with a hand-painted message DANGER! Go Back! Go Back where? I wondered. I had the most absurd thoughts roll through my mind, for the sign reminded of those old episodes of Scooby Doo...Where Are You? I chuckled, equal parts of amusement and nervousness. I convinced myself that the sign was probably someone’s idea of a clever sight gag. I turned on the radio, to no avail. I could only get one station, which was broadcasting a commercial. “Hello. My name is Reverend Earl Daniels, Clerk at the Vagabond Motel in Trout Creek. If you’re in our neck of the woods, why not drop in and rest a spell? We guarantee you a good night’s rest in our clean, quiet rooms. Stay with us for an unforgettable night of sleep. We also offer a continental breakfast, and if you don’t enjoy your stay, then it’s free. That’s right friend. Free.” The commercial ended and the signal went dead. The commercial ended and the signal went dead. I was surprised by the coincidence, for that’s the place I was looking for. After I shut off the radio is when I spotted it, about twenty yards off the road. It was a two-story, cracker box building with peeling paint and a neon sign that looked surreal. Maybe it was because there were no street lights to speak of – in fact, no telephone poles, period. Neither was there illumination from the moon; the area was pitch-black, but there sat that Vagabond Motel, its VACANCY sign aglow in neon red, the windows lighted a pale yellow, and the building itself looking like a large, hollowed out pumpkin. There was another sign, faded white lettering against a light blue backdrop that read Stay With Us For An Unforgettable Night Of Sleep. Even more eerie was the fact that there wasn’t a single car parked outside, yet, the rooms appeared to be filled, for I could see the silhouettes of the inhabitants scurrying about. As I pulled my station wagon across a gravel parking lot, headlights revealed a large, worn tire that was once attached to a semi-trailer. Standing nearby, like a sentry asleep on duty, was a 1950’s era Coke machine. I could hear the hum of the contraption even before I shut off my car’s engine. I parked in front of the door of what I thought was the office, a screen door through which a low wattage bulb cast light on the warped planks of the porch. I took a deep breath, shoved my pistol into my waistband and stepped from my car into the dry air. I saw a vending machine that had but two bags of chips inside. Upon closer inspection, I discovered that they were covered with dust and several large roaches. “Shit!” Zydeco music flowed from inside. There was a HELP WANTED sign on the door, I chuckled and shook my head. That was when the screen door swung upon, but no breeze had pushed it open and there was no one in sight. It was like someone, something, knew I was there and was inviting me in. I stepped inside, where I was greeted by a stench that reminded me of my Uncle Lou’s unwashed feet; a pungent odor like stale corn chips, only stronger. A man with a pasty face – and I mean pasty, sickly looking, like a sheet – sprang from behind the door, wielding a machete. The only reason I knew he was there was that I’d seen his shadow on the wall before me. I ducked, spun, backpedaled and drew my gun all in one motion. As the man raised his weapon he cried out, “Can’t you read? The sign said go back!” I fired two shots into his chest and the machete fell to the floor, followed by the thud of the man wielding it. I looked around, to make sure no one else was coming. I heard footsteps on the stairwell to my right. I heard the voice of a child behind me. I whirled to find an ashen girl of no more than eight. Her eyes were black jewels—onyx, and they were wide, but not with innocence. Her eyes held a vacant and haunting quality. She was carrying a Raggedy Ann doll under her arm. “You just shot Reverend Daniels,” she said quietly. “You shouldn’t have done that, mister.” “Just tell me how to get out of here,” I snapped. “There is no way out. When you check in, that’s it.” “Huh?” The girl pointed toward the door, or at least where the door once was, for now it was a solid wall. I blinked and stared again – no door. I worked my eyes around the room. No exit, not even one where the little girl had come from. Meanwhile the footsteps on the stairwell were getting closer. The girl smiled, revealing a row of blood stained teeth, and the next time she spoke, it was in a bass baritone. “Since you ignored the sign telling you to go back, let me welcome to the Vagabond Motel. Hope you enjoy your stay.” She dropped the doll and leapt toward me, tearing at my face. I managed to squeeze off two shots, both of which struck her in the abdomen, and knocked her against the wall. She rose, narrowed her eyes and again came forward. The people on the stairs—a half-dozen or so, looked on, smiling and bleeding from the mouth. From the corner of my eye, I saw the fingers of the Reverend Doolittle... Duncan, whatever the hell his name was, twitch. I fired off two more shots at the growling girl. The growl came from deep within her and was guttural like that of a wolf, poised to strike. The bullets...hell, I guess I missed or they passed through her or something. Then I felt the Rev’s hand wrap around my free hand. I fired two more shots into the Reverend, which slowed him a bit, but by that time, the child had sunk her teeth deep into my flesh and was pulling skin, sinew and bone fragments from my shin. I let out a scream as I saw the blood leak from her mouth onto the floor, and as the people on the stairs moved forward, spurred by the sight of the red goo spurting from my leg. I felt the so-called Reverend bite deep into the flesh of my thigh, through my trousers. I realized there was no way out. Panic swept deep intro my bosom and caused my heart to hammer erratically. Rather than endure the death of ravenous mouths tearing at the remnants of my flesh, I fired the last bullet into my head... *** Joe Sturgis mopped sweat from his brow and avoided the laser-like glare of his wife, seated next to him. Their eight-year-old daughter sat in the back seat, her feelings somewhere between boredom and disgust. The air conditioner in their SUV was blowing warm air and the temperature outside was near ninety degrees, even though it was after ten o’clock at night. “Maybe we should just turn back and try and locate the freeway,” Glenda suggested. “No, I’m guessing there’s a shortcut somewhere nearby. There’s no way this lonely stretch of road can go on much further.” “You said that fifteen miles ago!” Before Joe could respond to his wife, his daughter added her two cents. “You wouldn’t have to guess if you’d done like I told you and brought a map when we were at that gas station.” “If you tell me that one more time, Caitlin, I will pull this car over and—” Joe shook his head, cut his threat short and took a deep breath. He turned to his wife. “Glenda, see if you can find something on the radio, would you?” She tinkered with the tuner, and couldn’t locate a single channel until she got hear the end of the FM band. The station was playing a commercial. “Hello. My name is Tom. I am the new clerk at the Vagabond Motel in Trout Creek. If you’re in our neck of the woods, why not drop in and rest a spell? We guarantee you a good night’s rest in our clean, quiet rooms. Stay with us for an unforgettable night of sleep. We also offer a continental breakfast, and if you don’t enjoy your stay, then it’s free. That’s right friend. Free.”

Treason Salvatore Buttaci Lorna dropped herself in slow motion onto the cold concrete floor. A cross between sitting and sprawling, it never failed to please the eye. “My final words, all right?” she promised again. “Somebody tell me what the hell got us into this hell?” But none of us spoke except Clay. “We did the treason thing, Lorna. What else you wanna know?” We were “The Seven,” an unimaginative handle the media had ascribed to us. We had committed “The Big T” at a time in history when most disillusioned New Americans were clandestinely turning their backs to the Power in Charge. Our mistake was turning our backs in front of the Power in Charge. We didn’t care a nano-hoot about the serious dues we would owe the piper. In our secret underground theater, we were working on a play about blowing up the Power Palace. During our last rehearsal, at the end of the first act, we were apprehended by the ForensiCops who worked double shifts to uncover traitors via their Vocabulary and their Gov-DNA games. I had written into our scenes enough poison to kill an elephant, but they were just words, euphemisms, undetectable I thought, but I was wrong. The Trial of EveryPerson was our traitorous three-act play in which the characters swear allegiance to the just cause of toppling the Power in Charge and replacing him with a true man of the people. It was a noble, well-planned endeavor––as I said, a just cause!––but as with most good intentions, it never grew wings or even wheels. “We didn’t do anything!” again the red-haired Lorna broke her promise to let it lie. We shook our heads. She was so beautiful and quite annoying as well. Clay wanted to know what the media bums were spouting off about them. He rose from the floor on deceptively thin legs, brushed off the seat of his green prison trousers and said to no one in particular, “We are famous.” Clementina Hernandez stood at the cell door, looking out at the corridor. Without turning she said, “How about ‘The Seven-course Meal for the Fishes’”? We turned towards her at the same time as if we were sharing the same head. At seventeen she was the youngest of our acting troupe and the person who saw the proverbial half-full glass and the rainbow after the storm. Even in this bind it was strange she could learn to be so cynical. She had been the last to join us, despite our objections. It was dangerous work we told her. We were actors but what we were involved in made us also traitors. We reminded her that this was 2106, not an easy year to be on the wrong side of the law. Walk away we pleaded, but her brother Garrett was part of our company and she adored him, wanted to be with him, and Garrett had a hard time saying no to her. Besides the two of them hated their father so much that even if we failed, she could deliver up to him one or two more deaths in the family for him to chew on and swallow down into bellyful remorse. Clay on the other hand was in his forties. That’s surprising because when he laughs, it’s a hollow cackle the old and toothless are famous for. “I like that!” said Clay. “Food for the Fishes. How about ‘The Seven Hooked Bait’? Clementina, I think you got what it takes, Kid. Nothing like a little comedy to spark up a funeral. Why not, right? Maybe we can write a song-and-dance routine, practice it, take it on the road.” If our eyes darting at Clay could have been poison darts, he’d’ve been one dead pricked fool. Clay just winked. I’d known him for years. He enjoyed lighting the short fuse on the keg of everyone’s patience. He was good comic relief and he knew it. I’d seen him in some very funny plays and decided he’d be good in mine. “Save the jokes,” Garrett told Clay. Then sarcastically added, “It hurts when I laugh.” Again Clay winked and slowly sat down, his back sliding down the prison wall. Meanwhile, on the outside, life moved along. They had shut us down, but the world was still spinning. Slave laborers in Wormwood went right on being slaves, their heads bowed as the Munitions foremen shouted orders to keep working. They never looked up to see if the sky was falling. We should be so lucky, I thought to myself. Angel City buried under boulders of an expired planet. We’d all be at peace. Instead, the sky did not fall and the conveyor belt of conformity pulled the slaves through their lethargic paces. As for us, we were traitors living on limited time. Where once the suburban streets of Wormwood teemed with the clamor of happy talk and uplifting laughter, music and drama, now they were dead-silent as the old-time churches our ancestors attended, where they read their holy book, before the law mandated reading a crime against the state. A crime punishable by torture, and those avid readers who had trouble putting a book down, were burned with their books. It took little to imagine on the outside of these stone walls the cleats of the ForensiCops sounded against the pavement as they corralled workers into moving four-abreast. In their black-gloved hands, they brandished aluminum skull bashers and would drive them crashing down on the heads of those who fell out of step or fell from hunger or dropped from exhaustion. They were heading to or from the armament factories on Munitions Row in the old Chinese Theater district of Angel City. I turned to Ophelia and asked, “Remember Act One?” Her eyes ignited into those green sparkles I had come to depend on back when rehearsals hit rock bottom and I would question my own sanity. It was Ophelia whose faith invigorated my lapsing courage. I had only to look at her, the way she tilted her head as I directed her scene, that smile worth all the hell we’d pay once the curtain rose and we sealed our destinies. Ophelia the eternal optimist who refused to wax cowardly in the face of doom. I loved her with a suppressed passion. I had for a year now this dream where Ophelia and I become procreation partners and blissfully live out our lives together. If I had been a wiser man back then, I would have listened to my fears and trashed the play, opted instead for love and life. “It was your best act, mon directeur,” she said, tearing me from my daydream. “My only act. Our last rehearsal. Remember? Once the heckling cops––who the hell invited them!––started shouting us down, no way we could get on to Acts Two and Three.” She took my hand. Even in this Wormwood Prison, even on one of our last days alive, I felt blessed. Excuse a playwright’s melodrama, but Ophelia’s touch made me so glad I was alive and close enough to her now to hope she would never release my trembling hand. All right, maybe not trembling. Maybe perspiring. Warm. But for sure I was happier than I’d been days ago before the ForensiCops hauled our asses to this dungeon without luxury of trial. Now here, one step before the fall, I was scraping the memory barrel for last-minute pleasures. Clay started talking again. “Your Act One didn’t even make it in the next day’s rag. That’s why we sit around now in the dark, assuming the reviews were rave. Something like ‘The Trial of EveryPerson’ was a welcome relief from all the other outlawed plays that were never presented to an audience. The three-act play, abbreviated to a short first act, boasted an outstanding cast of seven. It demonstrated how these seven, including the director Floyd Cavour, in a matter of less than half an hour, could so dramatically throw their lives away. Tall, raven-haired Ophelia L’Esprit was a believable heroine, with enough beauty to choke a horse and––” “That’s enough!” “I hit a nerve, Cavour?” Ophelia waved her hand. “Let him talk, Floyd. He is happiest when his mouth moves, even when what comes out is worthless chatter.” Clay found that funny. “If they serve me a last meal, I’m gonna turn it down and let you eat it, Cavour. And you know what I’ll order? My last meal? Roasted Crow!” Lorna screamed “Shut up!” We were all too tired and hungry and downright numb to fight the flinch her loud outburst caused. “Give it a rest, Clay,” Lorna went on. “We are heading for the Big Fan. Do we really have time to laugh at one another? We should hold hands and then our breaths and hope for a speedy ending.” The Big Fan reminder quickly sobered Clay. Pinching his lips, he made the mum sign and walked to the far corner where he sat down again. So for the next who-knows-how-long we sat or stood or leaned or lay against the stone, silent as that speedy death Lorna hoped for. After awhile Clementina did her best to fill the silence with sobs, but no one comforted her, nor did Lorna scream ‘Shut up!’ I looked at each face, trying mentally to memorize them all. After all, I had secretly recruited them for the cast of ‘The Trial of EveryPerson’ and because of my success in convincing them to break the law in the name of drama and integrity, I felt responsible for what had transpired. Their deaths rested heavily on my conscience. I was their director. And I had directed them to this prison and soon to their deaths. Years ago when I was about five, Grandfather told me stories that his great-grandfather told him when he too was only a boy. If I had been older, he might not have confessed a thing to me for fear I’d tell others and be hustled away to prison or even death. At five I was a precocious child, a kind of wall with ears. Those tales he told delight and haunt me still. Grandfather said once there was a book of laws written to protect the people’s freedoms, but the book had been destroyed. One great man led an army across a river somewhere in Old America. Another, homely as bruised fruit, but with a heart heavy with compassion, freed the dark-skinned, shouldered a civil war, united a nation, and died at the pistoled hand of a pro-slavery fanatic. So many stories! Then, according to Grandfather, in a string of decades everything changed. Five successive war hawk Presidents dragged the country into the Third and Fourth World Wars, ordered an end to rights of privacy, personal liberties, citizens’ rights, until the great book that once kept a nation brave and free was tossed into the flames with all the other good books in the great and small libraries of Old America. When Grandfather spoke the stories, his voice got weak; his eyes, misty. “Why are you crying, Grandfather?” And he would force himself to smile, even to laugh it away. “Happy tears, Floyd. Every last one of them.” I sat there meditating on his stories. With execution not too many breaths away, nothing could depress me more than those Grandfather stories that caused him to weep like a child. They had happened long ago. A hundred years or more? Too many war years had toughened the hide of a gentle nation that did not learn the old adage: “If you fight the monster long enough, you become the monster.” The enemies of Old America had brought to our doorsteps evil of every kind. Chemical rains, poisoned waters, fires blazing across the country, and then finally nuclear devastation that nearly leveled a continent. American leaders demanded totalitarian rule. They renamed us New America, as if that could make a difference. New America. And none of us aware of the Old America and how much better it was, at least during the early times before the tyrantsrejected God, the same God who blessed Old America. The same God, the same Old America, Grandfather said the people once loved. “Floyd!” I turned my head to the sound of my name. I saw Clementina hunched over the sleeping Vander Harris. “Floyd!” she called again. “I think Harris is dead!” As if on an actor’s cue, we ran to where Harris lay facing the prison’s far wall. Clementina was touching his bearded face. His eyes were barely visible behind thin half-closed slits. Then Clay was kneeling down beside Harris’s body. “Cold as kraut,” he said. “Must’ve died hours ago. Maybe a day.” Clay stood up beside me. “Then there were six,” he said. “If we’re lucky,” said Lorna, “they can carry us out of this jailhouse too. One by one. Let the bastards open the cell and find the job already done.” Clementina was shaking. “I thought he was asleep. He was lying there, his face to the wall. What killed him?” I wanted to tell her life killed him. Long before these three days. Magnificently he had portrayed in my play an archangel who shows EveryPerson the way to freedom. Now some merciful angel had come and taken him out of harm’s way. If Grandfather was right, Harris was already a free man in a new life. But to Clementina I said, “He had enough.” Garrett embraced his young sister, unembarrassed when she cried against the chest of his green prison shirt. “We need to be strong, Tina,” he said. “Strong together. You and me. All of us here.” Then he looked down at the man whose death made us the Six. “Rest in peace, Harris.” Absent now of his cutting wit, Clay knelt on one knee and said to the body still curled against the wall, “Vander Harris excellently portrayed the archangel who lead the people to salvation. More than white wings impressed the audience of Harris’s angelic quality. He looked, spoke, walked, and flexed those wings the way we would imagine an archangel would. Rest on your laurels, good fellow Harris. Sleep now.” Finally, one by one, each of us paraded past Harris with quick goodbyes. I thought of Grandfather, how he believed after all this the good of heart would march into a new life. If he was right, I figured Harris was right up there with the rest of the good folks. We let the silence keep us still for awhile. Then we heard Lorna why play acting was so terrible to deserve a death sentence. “A play,” she said. “We didn’t do all those things our characters did or planned to do. It was all made up. Did we bomb the Power Palace? Did we say we meant it when we threatened to bring down the government in the name of a Pax Americana? It was fantasy. Nothing at all.” Then Lorna looked at me. “You wrote the damn play, Floyd. Were you planning a revolution?” I nodded. “Great news, that!” she screamed. “So you wrote treason we thought was a play. We acted in it in all those rehearsals. A play without an opening night. And when we finally get it right––best rehearsal of all, and that was just the first act––the bastards call down the curtain. We are on our way out because we were too stupid to realize how stupid we were!” Clay made a futile motion to throw his arm over her shoulder. She’d have none of that. “Hey, it’s not definite we’re dying,” Clay said. Ophelia rolled her green eyes and twisted an unpleasant curve to her lips. Garrett shook his head. “He’s right,” I said. “Those bumbling scientists accidentally discovered the Time Portal.” Clay smiled. “They found the perfect way to get rid of undesirables: dump them into the time warp.” None of us knew exactly how it came about. We were actors, not scientists. We did know they were playing with photons and temporal equations for over a century, then one of their golden boys found an equation that worked. First a monkey, then a slave, and then a political prison crammed with Republicrats who were ushered through the Time Portal into the past or the future. Fact is they never came back. The Power in Charge announced those criminals were somewhere or somewhen. It didn’t matter; they were gone. Garrett the skeptic asked, “And we take their word it worked?” “Not at first,” I said. “Not for plenty of years. Thousands of prisoners were exiled through that portal. It was easy to suspect time exiles were possible.” Lorna stood at the steel bars of our cell. “Maybe they burned them. Said they disappeared somewhere in time.” “They disappeared all right,” I said. “About twenty years ago, a young kid about fifteen, was pushed through the Time Portal. His father had been arrested for treason, and they decided his whole family would be likewise punished. You see, this traitor had only one son. The kid. Nobody else, so the father and son bought the portal. Now here’s the weird part: last year––and this tidbit comes from a ForensiCop’s lover––the same kid comes back! Older now, maybe thirty-five, but he’s the same traitor’s son they exiled years before! So this time they hang him to make sure he’s gone for good.” Clay stood beside me now. “Floyd knows what he’s talking about. Me and the director here, we know the story.” What he was really saying was, “It gets worse.” The Power in Charge knew the Time Portal held no guarantees dead was dead. They couldn’t risk a condemned man or woman coming back with an army to bring on the New American Revolution. So they spiced up the sentence. First the prisoner had to swim through the waters where–– “The Big Fan,” said Clay. “Oh, it’s still the Time Portal that takes you to the past or future. But first you swim through the spinning Big Fan.” I took over from there. “It spins underwater. Biggest whirling fan you could imagine. Takes up nearly all the water space so a prisoner’s chance of swimming through its sides, outside the fan’s circumference, without touching the giant blades.” “About as possible as these prison rats being served cats for dinner,” said Clay, “but not impossible.” All eyes shifted from Clay to the steel bars that made up the door of our dark cell. The guards had switched on the lights, one by one, till they were all beaming brightly. We let our eyes slowly squint open. It was time. Three days since our arrest. Harris had his Big Fan sentence commuted when he closed himself up and died. The rest of us would swim for our lives or take to the bloody blades. Four ForensiCops entered and shut the cell door. Hard steel echoed up and down the stone walls. I recognized one of the cops. It was his lover who had shared with me too many top secrets when the two of us met in bed upstairs from one of the secret clubs in Wormwood. Now he was looking at me as if I were familiar, then averted his glance towards the other five. Judging by the other cops’ discomfort, I assumed this one was the commander. When he handed the document to one of the them, I was sure. He nodded and the cop began reading. “The Government in Power of New American Forces has judged and found guilty these traitors: Clay Laird, Clementina Hernandez, Floyd Cavour, Garrett Hernandez, Lorna Peres, Ophelia L’Esprit, and Vander Harris.” “Where is the seventh?” asked the commander. Ophelia pointed to the body of Vander Harris. “Harris is dead,” she told him. The ForensiCops chuckled. The commander said, “Lucky Harris.” Then he hardly looked into anyone’s eyes except mine. Maybe his lover got talky one night. Dropped the name of Floyd Cavour. “Oh, Darling,” she might have said, “he was a passing ship in the night. Nothing much happened. Nothing ever does ‘cept with you.” Or she said, “Send that lying bastard two trips to the Fan!” “Have we met before?” I shook my head. “Speak up!” I stared back at him. “Not formally.” He smiled, remembering. “In your underground theater that evening,” he said. “I was there. Do you recall that?” I shook my head, thought better of it, and said, “No, Sir.” He pulled on his ear, then the other one. Then he folded his arms the way people in an audience do when they’re waiting for actors to show their talents. Go on, they want to say. Impress me. What can you do? “You were the leader,” he said. Now he was pulling on his thin blond moustache. “The director,” I corrected. “I directed the play. I also played the jailer. A bit part.” I smiled at the irony. “It was our last rehearsal.” “Yes, the last one,” he said. Anger seething inside me now translated into newfound courage. What did I have now to lose? Grandfather used to tell me that truth sayers pay with their lives, and if I wanted to live, I ought best learn the art of deception, but at this point––the end point of my short thirty-seven years––what could happen worse than death? “Yes,” I began, “the last rehearsal but outstanding enough to make its point.” I raised my chin to show I’d said that with pride. “Outstanding enough to make it to Theater Row, if there was a Theater Row, but you fellows in Power saw to that by closing all the theaters. Why was that? Don’t you like a good show?” He was uncomfortable. The commander did not like being on the other side of the grilling game. He looked like the kind of worm who would take pleasure in the squirming of those whom he considered worms. His smile was shaky. A tic pulled the right side of his fuzzy blond upper lip so high it nearly closed his right eye. “Theater,” he said, “is counter-productive. Make-believe. Fiction. Old America perished because of such stupidity! And what good did it do you? What profound theme did you teach your audience? All of whom, by the way, suffered because of you and your acting monkeys. They were heavily fined two-weeks pay and hours added to their work week. Was it worth the bother?” Then he addressed one of the ForensiCops. “Corporal, read them procedure now.” The corporal coughed first, then read how the six of us would walk through the cell door, down a lengthy corridor, into the spacious hall that preceded the huge door leading into the pool that housed the Big Fan. “If you succeed in swimming around the Big Fan’s blades, you will reach dry land where the Time Portal stands. Walk through it.” Clay stepped forward. “Do we line up in the order you called our names?” The commander shrugged his shoulders. What do you wish?” he asked Clay. “To go to the head of the line. I was the first to join the cast. Me who showed up because I like acting. And life was getting much too real. I needed a little fantasy to keep my head on right. Now I want to be the leader.” “Then you are first. And who then will be second?” Ophelia stepped away from the group, placing herself behind Clay. I followed and stood behind her. Garrett held Clementina’s hand, even while he stood in front of her on the line. We waited for Lorna who had raced back into the dark cell towards the dead Harris whom she tried desperately to awaken. Kicking his body. Cursing his good fortune. Begging the cops to let her go home. I made a gesture to the commander that said, Let me persuade her onto the line. “Go ahead,” he said. I held beautiful Lorna in my arms. Lorna who saw no treason in the words and movements of our treasonous play. This sensitive woman who hated injustice and often spoke of the need for political change, even revolution, if that’s what it took. Lorna who now had stopped crying, embraced me back, and walked to the end of the death line. Those about to die see their lives march before their eyes. So they tell me. All their past sins and dreams dance across their mental screens, giving cause for regret or remorse or resignation. Some say the last the drowning hear is sweet music, a coda to close their lives. But in that single-file line all I could think of was, how hilarious we six condemned fools looked! An idea for a new play: six barefooted characters in their dark green prison shirts and trousers, each representing a day of the week. Harris at rest would be Sunday. We would each extol our particular day. We would recite how essential we were. Monday is a work leader. Tuesday is an obedient slave. Wednesday is. And so on. And which of us was today? What was today? I think, Saturday. We would possibly all die on the liveliest day of the week. Secret clubs. Underground theaters. We won’t be there this week. We’ll be busy swimming for our lives. “Move,” ordered the cops, tapping our shoulders with their shiny skull bashers. “Keep the line going.” So we walked and then stopped at the hall of the funnel into which each of us would dive. From the opaque glass of the funnel door, we saw the fuzzy outline of the Big––no! the Colossal––Fan and heard so clearly the deafening whirr that agitated the pool waters into rotating steel arms spinning out frantic waves. The man whose lover I would never kiss again asked, “Any final words?” “Can I read an entire play?” quipped Clay, then waved his hand and shook his head. I had plenty to say, but this was not the time for it. I had said it all in The Trial of EveryPerson, but nobody got to hear it beyond the select few, and that was only act one. I wanted to tell all of Grandfather’s stories, but he had told them in secret and I had made a promise I’d keep forever. I would love to have spit the most venomous words into the ears of these four cops, to the Power in Charge. Instead I shook my head no. Ophelia raised her hand like a schoolgirl. The commander wordlessly called on her. “I wish to say goodbye to my fellow actors. If there could be another world, another life for us out there, I would like to perform with them in a play of three acts.” Garrett and Clementina said nothing. Lorna smiled mysteriously. Even in these last minutes she worried me. We needed to keep our heads about us if we hoped to swim past the blades. I knew we all wanted to live. Why else had we resented this almost certain death sentence? Standing in our single line at the funnel door, Clay raised one arm the way a soldier in battle raises his to lead a charge or commence a volley of gunfire, then when the door opened, Clay dove into the pool. In turn we each followed. One by one, in what appeared to be nighttime pajamas, we moved our arms and legs away from the magnetic pull of the rapids caused by the killer blades. It would be for us either a watery grave or a watery womb from which we would be reborn in another time. I cupped my hands hard into the powerful waters, imagining the Power in Charge in his watchtower viewing it all through his retinal vidpod. Laughing sadistically. And I wondered if somewhere good leaders of New America would ever get their act together long enough to amass troops and depose both tyrant and his armies. More than likely it was too late for that dying nation to be redeemed. Meanwhile, I propelled my arms and legs and refused to tire and be sucked into the blades. I did see red waters as I plowed my way forward, but I kept swimming. On my left, blades screamed, their powerful currents forcing me away into a safe narrow route towards the Time Portal, which I could barely see yards ahead of me. Swim! Swim! I repeated in my head. Save your life. You can make it. Far enough now from the Big Fan to shake myself free of the water, I stood alone at the giant door. Then I heard behind me Ophelia. When I swung around, she was climbing the last of the marble steps at poolside. We fell into each other’s arms and would’ve remained there forever if time did not demand our entrance through the portal. Holding hands, we stepped our naked feet onto the threshold. “Wait!” The two of us spun ourselves around, reached down to help draw Clay, then Lorna, from the water. Clay had his back to us as he searched the waters. Then he said, “Garrett and his sister were behind me. She caught herself in the fan. He was strong. He could’ve made it but he dove in after her.” “What happens now?” asked Lorna. “Act Two?” Then she leaped through the Time Portal and each of us followed at the heels of the one ahead of us. We were flying through an endless color pattern of concentric rings that tossed us like cloth dolls for what felt like forever. Finally all four of us stopped spinning. We were still dressed in those ugly green prison suits, barefoot but dry as before the Big Swim. We were alive, far from Wormwood Prison, free at last of the Power in Charge. Past or future. It didn’t matter much. We could be hopeful again. “Did you sign the book?” asked a woman with a notepad. “You’re late.” We four knitted eyebrows at one another. Late for what? Where the hell were we? Did we jump from the frying pan into the fire? Our eyes took in the hectic scene that surrounded us. People everywhere. Some wearing wild costumes. Others moving huge electronics on wheels. In the corner a small crowd of what appeared to be dwarfs laughed in high falsetto. A young girl in pigtails entertained another crowd by tap dancing in shiny red shoes. “Excuse me,” said a tall, balding man. “Your names?” We gave them, which he wrote down on the long sheet in his hand. “I don’t have you down here,” he said, “but if Adrian sent you, Adrian knows what he wants.” He turned to walk away, then turned back to give us another hard look. “Dark green? Somebody screwed up here. You know what the color of the day is, for crying out loud.” Looking around, he said, “Nobody clued in the extras?” Then back to us. “Five busy ladies for days now have been sitting behind closed doors dyeing material and clothes a lovely light green, not dark, ok? Trade those horrible duds in for light green or you will look very silly parading around like that when they hustle you onto the set.” “Where in hell are we?” asked Lorna. Oh, no, I thought. Now she’s done it. Which started the balding man knitting his eyebrows. “Well, let me put it this way, Lady. This ain’t Kansas! Did you say hell? Guess some call it that. We call it Hollywood and we’re gonna give ‘em hell!” Clay responded with one of his hearty toothless laughs that started us all laughing along with him. Lorna, of course, was not yet satisfied. “And this year is what?” she asked. But no one bothered to answer. Important thing we were acting again. Wormwood a lifetime behind us. Hello, Hollywood! Clay nodded his head towards one of the doors. Ophelia reached for my hand. “Come on,” he said, “let’s get ourselves dyed light green!”

Troubles in This World Kalp Joshi I am living in a world Hard to live in Hard to survive we all have dreams that can be accomplished but it’s the violence and poverty holding us down how can we pursue our dreams I see the world in trouble Trouble of not being able to accomplish I just want to sacrifice and not live in such a world Not just be but millions are ready, ready to just die Neither faith nor courage can fight this world

Hong Kong Karma Kevin Brown The summer I realized girls didn’t have cooties, my father died of liver failure. I was not present at my father’s death, but figured it even, as he was not present for most of my life. The man I refuse to call “Dad” worked for people who never looked at him. Walking by, they’d say things like, tea or coffee, or just snap their fingers while my father smiled so wide his eyes closed and bowed until they’d passed. He smiled so much at work he developed a facial tick at home, and believed the only way to relieve it was to never stop frowning. At home, he rarely spoke when he talked, and never looked at Mom and me for more than a second. He’d drink bottles of Dynasty X.O., then snap his fingers for his shoes. He’d slam chairs and glasses and doors as he left the house, coming back late smelling not like Mom’s perfume. Mom would cry and yell while he sat in his chair, swigging brandy, his cheek nerves twitching. “It’s not our fault you’re just a corporate world eunuch!” she’d scream, and I would close my eyes and sometimes hear a sound like slippers slapped together and my mom crying even harder. Most times, I just heard snoring. His proudest memory was that he’d smelled Bruce Lee in person. He had the chance to shake his hand, but when the star walked by my father smiled and bowed, his eyes closed in instinct. “His cologne was so strong,” he’d tell me, his words slurring, his watery eyes upturned to the ceiling. “It was the smell of an important man.” One night, my father left to get right and never returned. The last time I saw him alive was the afternoon Mom and I went to yum tsa in Victoria Harbor. He was leaning over the railing, staring at a junk crossing the sea, the dark water like dragon scales in the breeze. “Father!” I said, waving my hands over my head like scissors. “It’s Cheuk Fan!” He gripped the rail until his knuckles went white, lowered his head, and walked away. Liver failure was listed as his cause of death because, Mom said, “You can’t just put ‘failure’ on a death certificate.” At his funeral, a woman we had never seen before cried. Mom did not. It is Chinese tradition that if a son is not present at his father’s death, the son must crawl toward the casket, wailing for penance. On my hands and knees, pushing his memory out behind me with each touch of palm and knee to the floor, moving toward the man who had always moved away from me, I could not help but marvel at what I didn’t know was karma—that finally, someone is bowing to my father, except that now, he is flat on his back. published in 2009 in the Taj Mahal Review

About Kevin Brown Kevin Brown has had work published in over seventy journals and was nominated for a 2007 Journey Award and a Pushcart Prize. His first book Ink On Wood is scheduled to be published in the summer of 2010. His website is www.InvisibleBodies.com.

Love Is Jamie VanGeest Sugary sweetness that melts in the heat, Regurgitated by bees to be licked up, Spread on toast and swallowed with satisfaction, Digests in the stomach and churns with waiting, Mixes with minerals, fats, and proteins Diluted into unrecognizable forms, Punches, flips, twists, and gurgles, Claws up acidic and bitter, Burns and buffs the tongue, Rots and festers in the sun, Sticks to the bottom of your shoe, Swallowed by dogs and decayed into the dirt, Soaked up by flowers to attract and tease, Sweet perfumes of attraction absorb the bees.

Jamie VanGeest bio Jamie VanGeest has a Bachelors degree in journalism from the University of Minnesota and worked for a year as a reporter for The Minnesota Daily. He is also the winner of the Minnesota Medical Association’s Award for Excellence in Journalism for an article he did on depression in college students.

It’s The Moon...No Make That The Man John Grey So you think that’s the moon. Think again. The great yellow orb is really a lover’s eye. You’re not staring out the window. You’re bunkered down beneath a man. It’s supposed to be pleasure but he’s so heavy on your chest you can hardly breathe. And down below, his penis is humiliating you with its swordsmanship. Your hips tap limply against the mattress like that defeated wrestler you saw on TV. But you thought to yourself, at least there’s the romance. Like that time you walked with him beside the river and he showed you the moon as if you didn’t even know it was there. And truth be told, you didn’t. At least, nobody had ever pointed it out to you before. You felt so light then like you feel so heavy now. Maybe it’s the moon that takes away the weight. And its imitators that put it back on. And you almost had yourself convinced that eye was the moon. Great yellow orb. It should have told you every night was the eclipse.

scratches John Grochalski reading a quick history of france i hear muffled crying behind the wall i let it be at first but it’s a horrible wail and moan a thrashing that i really couldn’t ignore much longer you can’t ignore shit like that so i put the book down and open the door and there she is matted hair in front of her face black t-shirt black jeans scratches down her arm blood in streaks face red with tears i think she looks like death a nightmare of adolescence holding her arm a caged animal ready to pounce heaving breath a common tuesday afternoon in brooklyn in the twilight of winter mumbling to herself how it burns the scratches something else as people move away from her as others crowd around gazing at the wreckage of the soul asking what is it asking her why she did it who she did it for but of course they don’t care and of course she doesn’t know why most of the time they never know but it’s always someone something life you and me and everyone who looks as we do a priceless madness when we can’t hold it in any longer when decorum goes out the window and it feels good to let the blood flow toward the bright sun shining in the ugly blue sky.

John Grochalski bio John Grochalski is the author of The Noose Doesn’t Get Any Looser After You Punch Out. He currently lives in Brooklyn, New York, in the area where you can still buy a pint of beer for under four bucks.

If the Shoe Fits Wayne J. Gardiner Something like this doesn’t happen all at once. This disintegration of dreams. It’s not like smoke diffusing into the air . . . or ripples from a cast stone receding into the calm surface of a pond. It’s not sudden. It’s a slow, gradual process. This fall from grace. When did it happen? Joe Harley wonders. He’s looking at himself in the mirror behind the hotel bar, between the bottles of premium vodka and bourbon lined up on the counter. He searches the face of the stranger looking back at him, turning to a left profile, the motion confirming that yes . . . it really is Joe Harley, returning his own stare. Does anyone know when it happened? Joe asks himself. Does anybody care? Joe Harley couldn’t see the reflection in the mirror of the man behind him, this man at the far end of the lounge. An enormous man. An unusual looking man. A man he’d seen earlier in the day. A man he had spoken with. He knew when it had happened. He cared. Joe Harley decides not to go running the next morning. When he pulls back the drape of his hotel window, the time and temperature clock atop the Marine Building reads six-fifty-eight. A half-second later it blinks out the temperature . . . minus fifteen degrees. The wind howls outside and buffets snow against the big hotel windows. “No way,” he says aloud. He is in the process of crawling back into bed when he sees the shoes. They are sitting beside the TV set, atop the long narrow dresser across from the foot of the bed. There is something strangely compelling about them. Joe Harley doesn’t recall putting them there. He thought he’d left them in the closet. But he does remember the peculiar, almost weightless sensation he had experienced when he’d tried them on the night before. He listens for another moment to the wind outside. “I must be nuts,” he says, reaching for the shoes. The rather unusual circumstances by which Joe Harley came to own a new pair of red and white running shoes had occurred the previous day. It was a mild January day in Milwaukee, with early morning temperatures in the mid-thirties. Joe Harley had run five hard miles from the Hyatt Regency Hotel to Lake Michigan’s shoreline, through Juneau and McKinley Parks, past Bradford Beach, and back again. A total of ten miles. A familiar feeling of elation buoyed him as he slowed to a trot, then walked through the front door of the Hyatt. To Joe Harley, running provided a sense of accomplishment and well being. He could run faster and further than anyone he knew that was pushing fifty years. Faster and further than most men twenty years his junior. It was one of few things left in Joe Harley’s life that he did well. But even as he savored the moment, the feeling of satisfaction was tempered by the undeniable realization that the high point of the day was behind him. It would all be downhill from here. The electronically operated doors closed behind him and he stepped into a lobby astir with the activity of early morning. A handful of people stood at the cashier’s counter. Here and there, others stood singly, or in pairs, checking watches, waiting for companions to join them for breakfast. They scarcely glanced at Joe Harley. Except for one man. He sat in a chair by the elevators and stared directly at Joe Harley as Harley walked to the elevator bank and pushed the “up” button. Harley looked self-consciously away, then a moment later, glanced back. The man continued to stare. Rude bastard, Harley thought. He decided to stare back. Even seated, the bulk of the man in the chair was unmistakable. He was at least six-foot-six . . . huge in stature without appearing to be overweight. He was dressed in a very expensive suit that was immaculately tailored. He stared openly at Joe Harley with no embarrassment. Finally Harley looked away, silently cursing his lack of resolve, and at the same time, the elevator, for being so infuriatingly slow. Harley felt perspiration trickle down his neck as he continued to wait. He was not entirely certain that the perspiration was a result of his morning run. A green light signaling the arrival of the elevator was suddenly illuminated above one of the doors, accompanied by a hollow ring as the door slid open. An uncomfortable Joe Harley hurried into the empty elevator, stabbing nervously at the number six. As the huge man watched with his baleful stare, the door slid shut. Joe Harley’s day was predictable. He wasted his first sales call on someone with no decision-making responsibility. On the second, he learned that his largest account would be cutting back their order by at least fifty percent in the next year. To make matters worse, his top competitor would be picking up the lost business. Joe Harley adjourned to the nearest tavern to drink away the rest of the day. He skipped the two-thirty appointment he had scheduled, not bothering to call and tell them he wouldn’t be in. He walked back to the Hyatt Regency at four-thirty, an hour he considered appropriate for a respectable out-of-town businessman to have a drink in the second floor lounge. A few were already gathering at the bar. Joe Harley took a seat and ordered a bourbon and water. While the level of activity around him slowly gained momentum, Joe Harley stared thoughtfully at the bourbon in his glass. Losing the Trendco business could prove to be the final nail in his career coffin. Things had been going steadily downhill for over three years. His volume of business had decreased while industry figures, and those of his associates, were up. He couldn’t deny that the opportunity had been there. Just as it had been in the three jobs before. But no matter what approach Joe Harley took, he seemed to make a mess of things. New business didn’t develop. Old accounts cut back or fell by the wayside. He’d muddled up his personal life the same way. All the elements for a good life had been there . . . an attractive, intelligent wife, two kids, nice house. He’d lost them too. Came home one day and they were gone. Joe Harley cursed his luck and ordered another drink. Between four-thirty and five the number in the lounge grew steadily. Ice clinked in glasses and people laughed as the tensions of the day melted away. A man in a tall chef’s hat brought in a tray of hot hors d’oeuvres and put it at the end of the bar. At five o’clock an attractive woman with a soft, lilting voice began to sing. The combination of music and bourbon soothed Joe Harley. He turned on the bar stool to watch her. As his gaze swept over the lounge, it stopped short of the woman at the microphone. For there, at a table in the middle of the lounge, sat the hulking man he’d seen earlier in the day, his eyes fixed firmly on Joe Harley. Harley swiveled his seat abruptly forward and riveted his attention on the patrons facing him on the other side of the oblong bar. The feeling of well-being that had finally displaced the despair that had been with him since mid-morning was suddenly gone. “Two bourbon,” a voice beside him said. “Make them Knob Creek.” Joe Harley did not have to look to see who had spoken. Nor did he wonder who the second drink was for. He turned and looked into the face of the big man. The malevolent expression that Harley expected had evaporated into one of the most engaging smiles he had ever seen. “Mind if I join you?” the big man asked, gracefully hoisting his considerable bulk onto the next bar stool. “I was just leaving,” Harley said. “What a shame,” said the big man. “I’ve taken the liberty of ordering a drink for you.” His tone was as congenial as it could be. “Thanks anyway,” said Harley. “I’m not in the habit of having strangers buy drinks for me.” He realized it sounded foolish after he said it. The big man threw back his head and laughed, a pleasant, deep, infectious laugh. “Oh, Mr. Harley,” he laughed. “Please don’t misunderstand me. I noticed your drink was nearly gone when I came up to the bar to freshen my own. You look as if you may have had a bad day.” The big man held up his arms in a gesture of helplessness. “I simply thought you might appreciate a drink.” Joe Harley looked suspiciously at the man on the stool beside him. “Is something wrong?” the big man asked. “How did you know my name?” “I was at the desk when you checked in,” the big man said. “I didn’t see you.” It was a challenge. “People often don’t,” the big man said. “Strange as it may seem, I often go unnoticed.” Joe Harley made no response. The big man shrugged in resignation. “You seem to be very upset, Mr. Harley. I thought a drink would be a neighborly gesture. Perhaps I was wrong.” The big man seemed about to gather himself to move away from the bar. Harley softened a little. One human being was trying to show kindness to another. It was not a gesture Joe Harley was accustomed to. “Wait a minute,” he said. “I . . . I’m sorry. I was out of line.” He paused for a moment. “I have been a little out of sorts.” He laughed a nervous sort of laugh. “You’re right . . . it has been a hard day.” “I understand the feeling.” “Are you in sales too?” asked Harley, encouraged by the possibility that he may have found someone to commiserate with. “No, I’m in the repossession business.” The big man lifted his glass. “Here’s to better times, Mr. Harley.” “I’ll drink to that.” Harley took a long pull on his drink. “What do you repossess, Mr. . . .?” The big man didn’t offer his name. “Many things, Mr. Harley. A great variety of things.” “Must be a depressing job.” “Actually, I enjoy it very much.” “But don’t people hate to see you coming? It can’t be something they look forward to. I mean . . . you’re there to take something away from them . . . something that was theirs.” “Odd as it may seem, Mr. Harley, most of them never see me coming. You’d expect in their situations they’d know they were going to have to pay the piper sooner or later, but most of those I call on are blissfully ignorant of any consequences that might result from their slovenly lifestyles. Even when I meet them face to face, it often doesn’t register with them that I’m there to collect.” “Seems like a pretty tough gig to me.” “You sound as if you feel sorry for them,” Mr. Harley. “I guess I do. I’ve had my own share of bad luck.” “Don’t waste your sympathy, Mr. Harley. If these people had any responsibility, any initiative, any promise at all, I wouldn’t be calling on them.” Joe Harley felt a little uncomfortable. “I still say it seems like a rough job.” The big man shrugged. “As they say,” he said, “somebody’s got to do it.” They laughed and Harley finished his drink. “Thanks for the bourbon,” he said. “I’m sorry I was so testy earlier.” The big man waved away his concern. “Would you like to do me a favor, Mr. Harley?” he asked. Harley became uncertain again. “You’re a runner,” the big man went on. “I saw you come in this morning.” “That’s right,” Harley nodded. “I work pretty hard at it.” “What size shoes do you wear, Mr. Harley?” “Nine. Why?” “What a coincidence!” The big man reached into a large valise that sat on the floor beside him and pulled out a pair of running shoes. They were white with a brilliant deep red trim. “These are size nine.” “Nice looking shoes.” “I’d appreciate it if you’d take them off my hands.” Harley laughed. “Don’t tell me you’ve repossessed a pair of shoes.” “Actually, they were given to me by a friend. They’re excellent shoes. Absolutely the best. Unfortunately, my knees just won’t allow me to run any more . . . old football injuries.” “I don’t know . . . “ said Harley. “Please, Mr. Harley,” the big man said. “If you can use them, by all means, take them. I’ll never use them myself.” And so Joe Harley had gone back to his room with a new pair of running shoes. He dropped them in the closet and flopped down on the bed to watch TV. He awakened a few hours later. Outside, the wind had picked up. A movie he had seen several times was playing again on TV. He had fallen asleep with his clothes on, and he got up now and took his suit off, hanging it in the closet. From the corner of his eye, he saw the shoes. The bright red stripe nearly glowing in the dim light. Joe Harley picked them up and examined them. Good thick soles that provided both comfort and support. The tread on the bottom was a series of flat, flexible, square cleats, each with a slightly indented “X” across it. He’d never seen any exactly like them. He looked for an identifying label and found none. No Adidas, no Brooks, no Nike. Not even a size number. “How the hell could that big guy wear the same size shoe I do?” Joe Harley asked himself. He hadn’t considered it before. The possibility seemed ludicrous now that he did. He sat on the edge of the bed and slipped the shoes on. He held his feet up and rotated his ankles, flexed his toes. “Feels good,” he said. He laced them up and stood, bending slightly at the knees, shifting his weight. A smile swept over his face. They were the most comfortable shoes he had ever had on. The fit was perfect. Joe Harley began to jog in place. With each strike of his foot, the shoes fairly sprung off the floor. It was almost as if they were doing the running and Joe Harley was simply along for the ride. He ran in place for over fifteen minutes. Fifteen effortless minutes. Running in place had always bored him. Now it was exhilarating. He stopped reluctantly and took the shoes off. It was nearly two o’clock. He put them away in the closet and crawled into bed. And now it is the next morning and he is running. Out the front door of the Milwaukee Hyatt Regency, south on Fourth Street to Michigan Avenue, east across the Milwaukee River, heading toward Lake Michigan. He’s running headlong into a bitter wind that whips snow into his face. He doesn’t notice it. He runs without effort, without discomfort, the unusual patterned X’s on the soles of his shoes leaving their mark behind him in the soft crunch of the snow. There are no other runners out on this day. Those who braved the street at this early hour scurried purposefully to their destinations, bundled in parkas and hats and scarves, their breath rising above them in wisps of steam, disintegrated by the relentless wind. Joe Harley runs on euphorically. Ahead, to his left, the Milwaukee County War Memorial and Art Center. He approaches the intersection of Michigan Avenue and North Lincoln Memorial Drive. He will veer to the left at the intersection and skirt the west side of the building, then swing back into Juneau Park. It is possible to pass the War Memorial on the right side, the east side. A sidewalk runs for some fifty yards between a low retaining wall that holds back Lake Michigan, and a ten foot high wall that bounds an elevated patio on the east side of the building. On a windless day, the route provides a beautiful view of Lake Michigan. On a windy day, fifteen foot breakers smash with ruthless fury against the concrete wall. He will veer left at the intersection. Ahead of him, the traffic signal blinks to green. Harley picks up his pace to make the light. He races through the intersection, straight through, and on down the path that leads to the lake. He is surprised that he hadn’t turned. He had fully intended to. The realization that he hasn’t seems somehow humorous. At the same time it is disquieting. It is as if he’d had no choice. He continues down the path in the direction of the lake. Two hundred yards further, he turns left, paralleling an asphalt walkway that winds along the edge of the lake. He takes care to stay a safe distance from the water on his right. It roils and beats against the bank, throwing sprays of mist into the wind. It is easy to avoid the water here. The open space at his left provides him all the room he requires. He looks ahead. It is a different situation up there. The narrow strip of sidewalk threads its way between the lake and the War Memorial. Huge, angry waves crash against the concrete walls. He will turn left at the parking lot on the south side of the Memorial—skirt the building on the west side, then swing back into Juneau Park. He will veer left at the parking lot. And then he notices the footprints in the snow ahead of him. He is startled by them. There have been no footprints preceding him on this run. Who else would be out running on a day like this? But the footprints stand out distinctly and stretch into the distance ahead. He makes a hitch in his stride and checks the length of the other runner’s stride against his own. It is an exact match. He runs further, staring down with fascination as he continues on his way. The pattern with which his feet strike—toes pointed slightly outward, the depth of the indentation in the snow—appears to be identical to the tracks that accompany him. It even looks as if it is the same size shoe. He moves over slightly on the path as he runs and brings his left foot down onto the track in the snow. Then his right. It is a perfect fit. He looks over his shoulder. There is only one set of footprints behind him. Footprint for footprint . . . cleat-mark for cleat-mark. He turns his attention back to the front. Beads of perspiration have formed on his forehead and are beginning to freeze in the wind. Still the footprints precede him. There is something else about them . . . something he cannot quite bring to mind. He looks more closely. There is a flutter within his stomach as he recognizes what it is. The pattern on the bottom of the shoe is a series of flat, square cleats, each with a slightly indented “X” across it. It is the exact pattern of the shoes he is wearing! His thoughts are broken by the sound of waves crashing into the wall, now less than fifty yards to his front. In a near panic he tries to veer left, toward safety. To his horror, he continues straight ahead. He makes a great, final effort to wrench himself free, but a force stronger than his will places one foot after the other, meshing exactly with the tracks that lead into the crashing swirl of water, now only ten yards ahead. Joe Harley screams. The explosion of water against the wall and the howl of the wind swallow his cry. Helplessly, he watches the tracks ahead of him disappear into a raging wall of water. He runs, full speed, into the midst of it. Churning water slaps against concrete and rushes back off the sidewalk and over the retaining wall, pulling at Joe Harley with an unholy force. He knows now what he must do. He reaches down and tears a shoe from his foot. As it slips free, he feels the bitter cold of the water grip him for the first time. Brutally driven by the wind, it threatens to freeze him where he stands. Sobbing in terror, Harley throws the shoe into the frothing lake. He reaches for the other, grasping at ice covered laces, his fingers numb, useless stubs. At that moment, a wave catches Joe Harley, and like a giant hand, smashes him head-first against the wall. As the water recedes, it takes with it, the lifeless body of Joe Harley. Sergeant Harry Nelson, reporting for duty on the night shift, enters the squad room, looking back over his left shoulder. His partner, who typically reports a half hour earlier than Harry, is sorting through a bag that contains the personal effects of a man named Joe Harley. “Did you see the size on that guy?” Harry asks. “What guy?” Still rummaging through the bag. “What guy? The guy that’s big as a house! The guy right there in the hall . . . “ They both turn to look, but there’s no one in the hall. “Must move pretty quick for a big guy,” Harry’s partner says. “He was right there,” Harry says. “Huge guy! Sharp suit. Called me by name too . . . like he knew me . . . kind of a strange look in his eye.” “Never saw him.” Back to the bag. Harry Nelson is on his third assignment of the past two years, each move a demotion from the previous one. “Lacking initiative,” they’d said in his review. “Little imagination . . . unenthusiastic . . . doesn’t relate well to others.” What the hell, Harry Nelson had thought. You need to be Dale Carnegie to be a cop? Harry Nelson takes another look down the hallway, shrugs, and turns his attention to the suitcase on the floor. “What you got there?” “Weird case,” says Harry’s partner. “Guy was staying at the Hyatt. Went for a run this morning along the lake. Apparently decided to jump in. At the back of the War Memorial.” Harry Nelson thinks about it. He is a runner himself. He’s run the same route many times. “How do they know he jumped? If he was dumb enough to be out running on a morning like we had today, maybe he was dumb enough to try to run through that little space between the Memorial and the retaining wall and got swept off the walk.” “They thought about that,” Harry’s partner says. “But when they got to the scene . . . “ He points to the bag. “Those running shoes were sitting right on the edge of the retaining wall. Damnedest thing! Nobody knows why they didn’t get washed over by a wave . . . or why he took ‘em off in the first place. But the fact he stopped and took off the shoes makes it seem like he must have jumped.” “Why would a guy take off his shoes? When he’s going to jump into a freezing lake, he stops to take off his shoes?” Harry’s partner shrugs. “Who knows . . . these nuts out there.” Harry Nelson pokes around in the bag. “Nice looking shoes,” he says. “Wonder if anybody would miss them?” “I don’t see how anybody’d ever expect he didn’t have them on. What size you wear?” “Twelve-and-a-half,” says Harry Nelson. He has already pulled the shoes out of the bag and removed one of his own. “Well look at this,” he says, pulling one on and lacing it snug. “A perfect fit.”

Poem #1 J. Kingston Reed As I follow this pen as a cult to its leader, over a page, pages to come, I realize the fear in traveling, always pointed to the ground like a pole, cemented, sucking dirt from the Earth. Watch the flow run off the page, I’m writing on the walls, paint the house, drown in ink, crush trees and cover my tracks with fresh sod. The imagination is fever, the pen is An instrument for details, something to hold behind your ear; there is nothing in it, save for the ink, that this poem could rely on.

Untitled Simon Perchik I kiss as if some warming stream still hides my lips, drink and a child not yet born tugs at the surface, calls out for tears --you close your eyes. What did you think would change or the cry you never hear again. It does no good to move my lips. Red frightens the water and deep in my throat this lulling is just more moonlight taking shape floating under your eyes --you can still hear one moon calming the other --don’t open your eyes. My kisses too will clot and be afraid cling to your lips, to this warm milk the sky all night breathing in, unable to drown or alone at the light you heard only once, not loud, trying again.

Clever Alex Sagona “You look beautiful.” I told her. She looked over her shoulder and sarcastically said, “Thank you for the originality!” I tried again. “Your eyes are like two crystal clear skies of blue!” She laughed, “Please, tell me more heartfelt cliche’s!” It turned into a game, we were both smiling. I tried once more. “You look like-” She interrupted, “A million bucks?” Her eyes lit up and she thought she had outwitted me. “A million bucks, tax free.” As I walked away, I could feel her eyes follow me.

Janet Kuypers reading a poem by Alex Sagona from Down in the Dirt magazine June 2010 (v083) Clever

Watch this YouTube video live at the Café in Chicago 06/08/10

Little Johnny David Spurr-Smith Little Johnny killed himself today. He climbed into the attic, found his daddy’s gun, and blew the back of his head onto the rafters. Little Johnny killed himself today. His mom found him, slumped against an old trunk, staring at his knees, about five pounds lighter than he should have been. She wailed, and wept, and got sick, and almost put the gun in her own mouth. Little Johnny killed himself today. He sat in his room for a full hour beforehand, willing up the nerve to just do it, just stop another gray morning from coming. Because it was either the attic, or another morning, another day. The whiskey helped him decide. Half a bottle, and he was ready to climb up the creaky stairs and into heaven. The whiskey, and not looking at her picture. That definitely helped. Little Johnny turned thirty-nine today. And tomorrow his little girl would turn nine. And she would miss him, but only for a little while, and only on every other weekend. He would fade away, like everything fades away, and that would be that. Little Johnny hurt today. And the day before that, and the day before that, too. How long since he hadn’t hurt? Couldn’t remember. Wasn’t honestly sure that there ever was such a time. The memories were there, of games, and girls, and booze that brought smiles instead of tears, but they were fuzzy. Out of tune. Skewed. Lost. Little Johnny took his pills today. He took four in the morning, two in the evening, and none that did any good whatsoever. But he took the pills, so that when asked he could honestly reply, “Yes, I took my pills today.” The very concept of the pills seemed to Johnny about as sensible as prescribing You-Hot for a broken leg. Could pills undo pain? Alter the past? Restore pride? Supply money? Put him back in his own home with his own family, where there was at least the illusion that he was a man and not a pathetic, middle-aged boy? If there were pills that could do that, well, that would be something. Little Johnny got up today. He woke, and enjoyed a few hazy seconds between the bad dreams and the worse reality. He stared out the window into the back yard of his parent’s home. He walked down the hall to the shower, past the door of his childhood bedroom, pondering how in not quite four decades of life he had managed to move all of fifteen feet. He washed, and shaved, and dressed, and went to work at a place where he called idiots ‘sir’ and demons ‘ma’am’, where rich brats smirked and sulked, and he was pummeled with the simple truth that hopes and dreams were deadly foolish things... And on the way home that evening, Little Johnny thought that it might be time to die. And when he looked in the mirror that night, he knew that it was. He could try to make it through another day, but he had no wish to. He’d tried, for a long time, but now he was tired of trying. There was too much pain, too much disappointment, too much shame. Afterward, they would call him selfish, but all he wanted was nothing. They would say he gave his pain away, and made others carry it. They would say little Johnny could never just grow up and be a man. They would say he was weak, naive, cowardly, ill, foolish, immature, sad, hopeless. They would say that the weeping, destroyed mother and stoic, wrecked father had failed at their jobs. They would say many things, but only for a short while, and then he would fade away. Little Johnny turned thirty-nine today, but he won’t be turning forty...

Where Hope Lies Benjamin Winship Pim flared her nostrils and tried hard not to cry. Crying is for worthless babies! The voice of her mom rang in her head. It only made her want to cry more. She kneaded her fingers behind her back and dug her toes into the dirt. She looked at the freshly painted red sign posted just before the border crossing. The words were nothing more than a series of half circles and lines to her. She had never learned to read. A few minutes ago, she had tried to cross over to Thailand, like she did every day, to beg. Today there was a new guard. When she tried to cross, he demanded money from her. He called it a beggar’s tax. Pim had no money, and she thought the man might be lying. She had tried to run across. He was faster than she was and he hit her with his baton. Then he told her to read the sign. Beggars from Burma have to pay 40 baht to cross over to Thailand. So now she stood looking at the sign and trying not to cry. She tried, instead, to reason out the situation with her eight year old brain. Her mom needed the money. If she didn’t get it, she would try and throw Pim into the fire when she came home in the evening. She would throw boiling water on her face and then whip her with long reeds of bamboo. Pim wanted to get the money for her mom, but 40 baht was hardly the amount she would get from a days worth of begging. She’d never be able to get that much unless she was in Thailand, where all the rich white tourists were. She walked hopelessly to the side of the bridge overlooking the river that divided the two countries. The border patrol was on the bridge. Maybe she could cross the river without being seen. She looked down at the brown water snaking its way through the foliage. There were more guards walking up and down the banks. They must have hired more to enforce the new beggar’s tax. Pim sniffled. She thought of running away from home, but pushed the thought away as quickly as it had come. If she didn’t take care of her mother, she was less of a being than the bottom feeding fish. She was nothing. A child could never disrespect her own parent. She rested her chin in her hands on the ledge of the bridge and sighed. The sun has just cleared the horizon. It was still morphing from pink-orange to yellow. There were scattered columns of smoke from burning trash climbing up into the sky. Pim wished she could climb into the sky like the smoke and be weightless. She wished it with all her heart, but it only made her body seem heavier. A motorcycle exhaust bubbled behind her and died. Pim turned around and saw a young man folding his aviators and stuffing them into the breast pocket of his polo shirt as he dismounted the bike. He had a grim face but Pim felt a natural urge that she ought to trust it as well. He pursed his lips in a slight downward curve and ran his fingers through the timid spikes of his hair. He approached her, examining her carefully, unashamedly. Pim turned her head to the side and looked at the ground. She kicked her bare foot back and forth self consciously as he approached. He must have been the same age as her mom – in his late twenties. He stopped in front of her and said, “Hey.” She responded by looking at his knees and bowing respectfully. “What’s your mom’s name?” he asked. It was more of a demand than general curiosity. Still, Pim didn’t feel threatened. “Kaimook,” she said pulling a stray hair from the wedge of her lips. The man nodded, looking back and forth along the road that crossed over the bridge. “I know her,” he said. “You want to make some money for her, no?” Pim’s eyes lit up. She dared to look into the man’s face and nodded. “Okay,” he said. “I’ll take you across the border to a good place.” He reached out his arm and opened his palm to her. She placed her small hand in it and let him clasp it roughly and help her onto the bike. He stabbed the key into the ignition and turned it, then he stomped the kick-starter and the bike roared to life. With a slight wave, the man bypassed the guard who had hit Pim only a few minutes ago, and they whizzed over the threshold and into Thailand. Pim’s hair flew around her face as they drove. She saw the rows upon rows of vendors under their wide umbrellas. There were noodle shops and jewelers every few meters. She passed by the corner where she usually begged. A boy about her same age had already stolen the spot. They turned a corner and went into an alley. Clumps of older white people trudged along, crimson cheeked and sweating like they always do. Pim imagined what might be in the bunches of bags clutched in their hands. The motorcycle halted in front of a tall whitewashed building. The man grabbed Pim by the hand and pulled her off the bike. He opened the seat and pulled out a small bag from the compartment underneath. Then he led her into the building. She could tell, from the few groups of white people eating breakfast in the lobby, that it was a hotel. The man made another wave, this time to the receptionist, who nodded in response. He took Pim into the elevator and pressed a button. The doors closed and they waited. Pim’s stomach turned as she felt the metal box carry them upward. Finally, there was a ding and the doors slid open. The man pulled Pim through a winding maze of hallways filled with doors that all looked the same. She couldn’t imagine how anyone was able to find their way in a place like this. The carpet tickled her bare feet as they moved and the AC gave her goose bumps. She wondered how she would be making money here, and how much she would make. Finally the man stopped at a door and knocked. Almost as soon as he did, a tall white man opened it. He had a bathrobe wrapped around his gaunt frame. Pim noticed white hairs poking out from the folds around his chest. The man’s face was starting to wrinkle around the edges, like a rotten mango. His eyes gleamed blue. He looked at Pim and smiled greedily. The man let go of Pim’s hand and shoved her into the white man’s room. A crumpled wad of money exchanged hands. “I’ll be back later,” said the man. “If you make the white man happy, you can have this.” He held up a 100 baht bill. It was hardly a fraction of the money in his hand. Pim nodded slightly. She was beginning to feel very afraid. She didn’t want the man from the motorcycle to leave. She wanted to go back to Burma. She wanted her mother. The man pulled a pair of metal handcuffs out of his bag and passed them to the white man. He winked and clicked his tongue and then he was gone. The white man pushed the door shut and said nothing. He just looked at Pim and smiled as if that was all he meant to do. Pim’s pupils clung to her toes. The white man jingled the cuffs in his hand and knelt down next to her. He lowered his head to catch her eyes but she turned her head to avoid him further. He flipped the edge of the cuff open and clipped it around her wrist. Then he lifted it up and clasped it to the foot of the bed. With her hand bound, Pim couldn’t stand up straight; she could either crouch or sit. She tucked her knees underneath herself and settled her bottom against her bare heels. The man was still staring at her. It gave her the urge to rearrange her shirt at the collar. She shifted it closer to her neck to hide her collarbones. Then she pulled the edges of her skirt down to cover more of her legs. The man squatted down in front of her. He leaned his head so close to hers that she could smell the sour beer on his breath. Wild curls of black sprawled out of his nostrils. He raised his puffs of eyebrows and flashed his yellow teeth. She cringed against the bedside with her raised wrist hanging limp in the metal cuff. The man flung his hand across her face. Pain flared into her cheek as the salty taste of blood spread across her tongue. A tear leaked down her cheek. It was hot and thick, like her mother’s disappointment. “Take off your clothes,” the white man demanded in English. His voice was like sandpaper against cold steel. She couldn’t understand him so he did it for her... # A thick crust stuck Pim’s eyelids together. She tried to open them but they wouldn’t budge. She moved her uncuffed hand and rubbed away the grime from each lid until they would open. She couldn’t remember how long she had been crying. She must have fallen asleep. The room was dim, with only the last rays of sunlight fluttering through the glass. Pim shifted her legs. Pain shot up through her abdomen. Flashes of memory, associated with the pain, bounced through her brain wildly. Without looking, she timidly reached her hand down and placed it gently on the inflamed skin between her legs. The pain roared again, like the heat of a bonfire burning inside of her. She thought she might not be able to walk. There was a knock on the door. As soon as it happened, Pim realized that it had been a knock that had awoken her in the first place. A chortle came from the bed and the white man slumped up. He swung his feet over the side of the bed and stood up like a gorilla who only just realized it could stand. He dragged his wrinkled form over to the door and pulled it open. There was the motorcycle driver. His aviators were still on. He smiled. The two of them talked in roaring voices that Pim couldn’t understand. She just sat in the corner, with her hand still stuck in the cuff, and waited quietly. Finally, the man came in and unlocked her cuff. Pim went to the edge of the room, under the window where the man had tossed her clothes earlier. She gathered up her shirt, skirt and underpants, and pulled them on. Then she walked over to the man with the aviators. She hugged the wall, staying as far from the white man as possible. He grabbed her roughly by the wrist and pulled her out into the hallway. As they made there way back into the labyrinth of doors and carpet, Pim glanced back and saw the white man one last time. He was standing naked in the doorway, wrapped loosely in white skin with that horrible red slug dangling between his legs. He winked at her and the door slid shut. “You’re lucky,” said the man as he pressed the button for the elevator. “The white man said you made him happy.” Pim was looking at the floor still. “White men are hard to please, you know?” He knelt down next to her and pressed a slice of money into her hand. “You did well,” he whispered. She didn’t want to look at him. She clutched the money in her hand and thought about her mother. Her mother needed the money and that was all that mattered. Her mother had told her a thousand times that they wouldn’t survive unless Pim could bring her money. “I’m coming, mother,” she said in an inaudible whisper. They stepped into the elevator and slid down to ground level. The man dragged her out into the parking lot, picked her up and set her on the seat. She could hardly move on her own because of the pain. He climbed on and started the bike. They pulled onto the street and zipped through the thin street crowded with vendors and shoppers. Bats darted here and there overhead, catching mosquitoes as they flew. The thick sweet smell of pork hung over the alleys as people prepared for dinner. Pim’s stomach growled. They sped past the hanging arch that separated the two countries. She was home. There were the street kids, kicking a smashed can back and forth. She knew their names. There was the guard from that morning, looking stern, daring anyone to try and cross without a pass. The bike slowed, and before anything else could happen, Pim jumped off. Despite the searing pain between her legs, she ran. She flung her legs out in front of herself as fast as she could, letting them carry her all the way to the small interwoven hut on stilts that she called home. Pim pushed the door open slowly and poked her head through. Her mother was there. A man was standing behind her and they both turned to look at Pim. Her mother’s eyes locked on to her with the intensity of fury. The man was thin and slouched. There was a black tuft of hair hanging from his chin. Pim’s mother grabbed her by the hair and pulled her in. “You’re lucky we don’t have a fire tonight,” she said twisting her ear, “Or I’d throw you in it.” She pulled her into the center of the room, alternating between yanking her ear and handfuls of her long black hair. “You’re lucky the water has already gone cold, or I’d throw it on your face.” She shoved Pim into the ground. Then she picked up the bamboo switch and whipped it across Pim’s legs several times. Immediately, red strips of skin puffed up where it had struck. Pim dropped the money at her mother’s feet and pressed her trembling hands against her legs to calm the sting. She skittered into the corner like a cockroach avoiding danger and settled herself against a pillow. Her mother gave the money to the man who in turn gave her a small plastic pouch. Then he shoved the money in his pocket and left. Pim’s mother turned to her, eyes bulging, and said, “next time I’ll tell Natachai to just keep you. You’re worthless!” Her voice was cold and indifferent, almost uncaring. Pim could only assume that Natachai was the man on the motorcycle with the aviators. She rolled over and tried not to cry. She imagined that she was a ribbon of smoke: purified remains of burnt trash. She puffed up effortlessly into the serenity of a rising dawn and drifted away, to a beautiful city hidden in the mountains. Her mom took something from a bag on the floor. The last rays of sunlight glistened against it for a second, and Pim saw that it was a needle. “What will we eat?” she asked her mom. “Hush,” was the distracted reply. Her mom clicked a lighter to life underneath a spoon. “It’s bedtime. Maybe tomorrow, if you bring enough money, we’ll be able to eat.” Pim tried to position herself so that there was a minimum of pain in her genitals, but there was no comfort to be found. She wanted to cry but in front of her mother she didn’t dare. A rubber strip snapped taught against her mother’s arm. Pim watched her dip the needle into her skin, press the plunger and sigh. She flopped down against the other pillow, in the middle of the floor. Pim blinked a few times. She was sure the pain would never go away. It kept surging up through her body like grime wedged under her skin. Despite her best efforts, a tear escaped from between her eyelids and rolled down her cheek. It was dark now, though, and her mother couldn’t see. She was still hungry. Maybe tomorrow she would be able to get more money. She had no choice but to rest her hope on that. Another tear dripped down her cheek. She wiped it away with resolve. “Tomorrow,” she whispered.

About Benjamin Winship Benjamin Winship graduated from Azusa Pacific University. Although this story is fictional, it is based on things that are actually happening to the children in Thailand where he currently lives. If you would like to get involved with fighting this atrocity, please visit ijm.org or at the very least gain awareness by researching the topic more in depth.