Lazarus, fiction by Brenda Rose

Posted on May 14, 2012 by Rusty

His boy had been dead eight days when the preach­er picked up the black, worn King James Bible with his name engraved in gold on the leather cov­er, and rein­sert­ed him­self in the pul­pit of the Mt. Cal­vary Holy Ghost Church, its steeple tow­er­ing like a mas­sive grave­stone, cast­ing shad­ows over the fields of local farm­ers. Since his return to the church, he’d felt a supreme anoint­ing in every ser­mon he preached, every prayer he prayed. In the dark days after his son’s death, he’d begun to dream, and in his dreams, he deliv­ered flam­ing ser­mons to hundreds—maybe thousands—of peo­ple, sav­ing souls and heal­ing the sick with a halo of fire blaz­ing tri­umphant­ly over his head. The dreams changed him; now, he car­ried a divine pow­er in his fin­ger­tips, and a celes­tial scent oozed from his pores. Like Moses, he’d seen the fire, and the fire burned over him, blazed inside him, and kin­dled the life puls­ing through his veins. He saw his own future as a fire and brim­stone tel­e­van­ge­list, toss­ing out mir­a­cles, lead­ing a cru­sade like the leg­endary Jim­my Swag­gert, his ser­mons deliv­ered to liv­ing rooms in homes across the country.

Six weeks after the funer­al, the preach­er watched his wife pull on a black dress to wear to church. He said, “I’ve missed you.”

His wife turned away from him. In silence, she pulled the hem of the dress from around her waist down to her knees. He want­ed to shake her and scream snap out of it. He was sick and tired of com­ing home to find his wife sleep­ing, curled up like a giant fetus, hud­dled with her grief in their dark­ened bed­room. He’d ham­mered her for weeks to shake off the depres­sion and step back into her role as the preacher’s wife. His dreams would nev­er mate­ri­al­ize if she didn’t put the past in the past and stand by him.

Since the funeral—since bury­ing their son in the pale blue out­fit she’d bought for his fourth birthday—she had pulled the left­over pieces of her heart into her­self. A blan­ket of silence dark­ened their home, suf­fo­cat­ing her with sor­row, extin­guish­ing the light in her eyes. Today, though, the preach­er felt the deep, unmis­tak­able pull of his faith; he felt a rush of excite­ment, a thrill, a mir­a­cle in the mak­ing. After a vivid dream he’d had sev­er­al nights in a row of mak­ing love to his wife on the church altar, he had pre­pared a ser­mon espe­cial­ly for this day. It was time to reclaim his wife and move into the future.

The preacher’s wife strug­gled with the back zip­per. She’d lost weight. Still, she was a love­ly woman with brown eyes and dark hair that fell in soft curls to her shoul­ders. The preach­er reached for the zip­per, but his wife whis­pered, “No.” She took a few steps back.

He knew he’d been hard on her in recent days, but it had been for her ben­e­fit. She’d wal­lowed in pity too long. They’d delayed order­ing a head­stone for the small grave in the ceme­tery behind the church because she said she need­ed time. Time! She’d had more than enough time to mourn and pick her­self back up. It had been six weeks. He didn’t under­stand his wife’s pro­longed grief; their son was dead and buried, and noth­ing could bring him back. It was time to put a head­stone on the grave and let go of the past.

The preach­er pulled a pais­ley tie around his neck, and said, “It won’t be easy for you today. Eli start­ed attend­ing ser­vices as soon as he was released from the hospital.”

He wait­ed for her response. She gave none.

He knot­ted the tie. “Every Sun­day he sits on the third pew from the altar, on the right side of the sanc­tu­ary. I real­ly don’t know how in the world Sis­ter Jody can play the piano with that freak sit­ting so close to her, pol­lut­ing the place like he does. He stinks. It’s distracting.”

He wait­ed again for a reac­tion from his wife; it did not come.

The preach­er adjust­ed his tie, inspect­ed it in the mir­ror, and said, “Eli’s face hangs par­a­lyzed on one side, and when he speaks, he slurs his words like a sor­ry drunkard.”

He searched her reflec­tion for a response etched in her face, but found it emp­ty. Brown eyes remained sunken and expres­sion­less, buried inside the hol­low grave of her face.

He slicked back his thick, dark hair and sprayed it stiff. “He sits there every Sun­day unashamed of his scarred face. Looks like the doc­tor was drunk when he stitched the pieces back togeth­er.” He turned this way and that, admir­ing his physique in the mir­ror. “He’s a con­stant reminder that our boy didn’t sur­vive. Eli is noth­ing but a freak and he’s turned my ser­vices into a freak show.”

He’d expect­ed a reply of some sort: an acknowledgment—a ver­bal agree­ment from his wife that, yes, it must be painful for him to preach with Eli present. Instead, she refused to even face him. His words dis­ap­peared as soon as they left his mouth, evap­o­rat­ed before reach­ing her ears.

She pulled up her long, auburn hair, pin­ning it in a neat bun on her head, leav­ing wisps around her sad, comatose face. She picked up her purse and said, “Then let’s go if you’re ready.”

He drove past thirsty fields of tobac­co with wilt­ed leaves brown­ing on the stalks. For days, clouds had moved through, threat­en­ing rain, yet nev­er deliv­er­ing more than a few sprin­kles. The preach­er tried to draw her into a con­ver­sa­tion, but he soon tired of his wife’s dead respons­es and drove on in silence, a ceme­tery of unspo­ken words spread between them.

His mind wan­dered back to Eli. The local media had report­ed that he’d risked his life to save the boy. From his hos­pi­tal bed, Eli had told the Sher­iff how he’d heard the boy’s cries while he was pick­ing up alu­minum cans on Granger Road; how he’d fol­lowed the screams to the desert­ed junk­yard; how he’d tried to pull the Rot­tweil­er, her tits swollen with milk, her new­born pups near­by, off the lit­tle boy.

In anoth­er attempt at con­ver­sa­tion, the preach­er cau­tioned his wife that every Sun­day Eli would limp his way down the aisle to a seat near the front of the church, his vul­gar, scarred face vis­i­ble and fright­en­ing to the chil­dren. He said, “The freak scares the kids.”

The preacher’s wife snapped her head around, her pained eyes slic­ing into her husband’s face. She asked, “Who’s com­plained about Eli fright­en­ing the children?”

He described vicious red scars that dis­tort­ed Eli’s face, pulling the flesh, man­gling it into a mask, and explained to her the repul­sive, raw scars had to spook the chil­dren even if nobody had complained.

His wife sighed, turned to the win­dow, touch­ing the glass with a soli­tary fin­ger. She said, “Just as I thought. Nobody has com­plained. You imag­ine things. And I bet you’re the only one who calls Eli a freak.”

The preacher’s face burned fever­ish­ly, his jaw locked in anger, cof­fee-stained teeth grind­ing in his mouth. His hands gripped the steer­ing wheel, paint­ing his knuck­les white. How dare his wife reproach him! She’d accused him of imag­in­ing things, yet she’d been the unsta­ble one—swallowing sleep­ing pills dur­ing the day, cry­ing, hold­ing their son’s ted­dy bear. His wife had no place defend­ing the freak. Eli hadn’t saved any­body except maybe his own self. Before long, his son would be noth­ing but a fad­ed mem­o­ry while Eli would live out the rest of his life as a hero. Because of the freak, the town would nev­er stop talk­ing about the death of his son. He choked the steer­ing wheel with such force that his knuck­les popped.

 

From his king-sized chair in front of the choir, the preach­er looked out into the con­gre­ga­tion, exam­in­ing his wife’s face as Eli shuf­fled in, his raw, jagged scars mag­ni­fied and daz­zling under the over­head lights. Her face soft­ened into a one-sided grin as she turned to the freak. The preach­er hadn’t expe­ri­enced that kind of ten­der­ness from his wife since their boy died. He gripped the arms of the chair and watched as his wife motioned for Eli to sit with her. A slow burn­ing stain moved up the preacher’s neck, cov­er­ing his face. His heart ham­mered out an angry drumbeat.

She reached over and squeezed Eli’s scarred hand with her small, soft one, con­tin­u­ing to hold it in her ten­der grip as the choir rose to sing. How dare that idiot sit next to his wife—hold her hand—his scars exposed to the church like the scars on the cru­ci­fied Christ. It was blasphemy.

As the singing end­ed, the preach­er strut­ted to the pul­pit, con­fi­dent that a halo of fire burned over his head, ready to offer the ser­mon that would change his wife and bring her run­ning back to him. She’d know after this ser­mon that he was on fire, anoint­ed, and the future was theirs to grab.

He placed his bible on the podi­um and said, “Open your bibles and turn to John, Chap­ter 11.” He cleared his throat. "Verse 39.” He read: "Jesus saith unto her, take ye away the stone. Martha, the sis­ter of his that was dead, saith unto him, Lord by this time he stin­keth: for he hath been dead four days." 

The preach­er saw his wife stiff­en and rear up her jaw. He’d expect­ed encour­ag­ing eyes; instead, she stared motion­less, her mouth tight, at the three cross­es hang­ing on the wall in the choir loft. He remind­ed him­self that she must feel trapped sit­ting so close to the freak. He’d tried to warn her this morn­ing, but she’d sulked and accused him of imag­in­ing things. Well she could suf­fer through the ser­vice. She’d cho­sen to sit with the freak and she would have to deal with the emo­tion­al con­se­quences of her decision.

He ripped into the ser­mon, imag­in­ing him­self as a tel­e­van­ge­list with the cam­eras rolling. “Lazarus had been dead for four days, but Jesus was about to restore his life.”

The preach­er slammed the Bible shut and tossed it onto the podi­um. He loos­ened his tie and said, “With enough faith, noth­ing is impos­si­ble. Noth­ing is too big for God.” His voice rose, boom­ing, echo­ing off the ceil­ing beams. "He is lord of all. Death can­not stand in his way. 1Just imag­ine the stench that must have filled the air when the stone was moved. The smell of ran­cid meat.”

Increas­ing the vol­ume of his voice, he instruct­ed the con­gre­ga­tion, “Inhale. Inhale right now and imag­ine the odor of decom­po­si­tion ris­ing from Lazarus’ corpse."

The pas­tor sucked oxy­gen into his lungs, demon­strat­ing to his con­gre­ga­tion that he expect­ed them to fol­low his instruc­tions. "Inhale again."

With the excep­tion of his wife, every mem­ber of his con­gre­ga­tion inhaled at his com­mand, vac­u­um­ing up all sound from the small church. Even Eli drew in clum­si­ly through his mis­shaped mouth and nostrils.

The preach­er thun­dered on. "His flesh had been decay­ing for four long days. By now, Lazarus' heart was rot­ting. The kid­neys hadn’t worked for days.”

Sweat dripped down the preacher’s face and dropped from his chin. He pulled out a hand­ker­chief and wiped his face. “Maybe the flesh had already begun to fall from the bone. Imag­ine it. Imag­ine what it was like inside that tomb when the stone was rolled back. It wasn’t a pret­ty scene. Close your eyes—picture it—smell it."

The preach­er looked at Eli who was sit­ting trance-like beside his wife, his eyes half-closed as though he were hyp­no­tized. His wife’s chalky face stared at the cross­es in the choir, her col­or­less lips quiv­er­ing. Maybe next time she’d lis­ten to him.

He yelled, his words wet with spit, "Pic­ture the scene. Lazarus is wrapped in the cloth of the dead. He's been in the heat for four hot days and the tomb reeks of a pun­gent odor."

He paused, wiped the sweat from his face, and demand­ed, "Inhale." And his congregation—except for his wife—inhaled again. A rush­ing intake filled the church.

The preach­er rushed over to the podi­um. He picked up the Bible, ran his fin­ger down a page, and said, “Vers­es 43 and 44.”

He cleared his foamy throat and began read­ing. “And when he thus had spo­ken, he cried with a loud voice, Lazarus, come forth. And he that was dead came forth, bound hand and foot with grave­clothes: and his face was bound about with a nap­kin. Jesus sayeth unto them, Loose him and let him go.” 

He slammed the Bible shut and yelled, “The lungs hadn't breathed for 96 hours. But hallelujah—praise the Lord—his lungs breathed again at the com­mand of the son of God.”

The preach­er unbut­toned the coat to his three-piece suit, pulled it off, and flung it onto the first pew. He parked his hands on his hips and glared at his con­gre­ga­tion before call­ing out, "Not even death can stop Jesus. No mir­a­cle is too big for him. With the faith of a grain of mus­tard seed we can raise the dead. At his com­mand, the soil will fly up and the cas­kets will break open. The dead will sit up in their bur­ial clothes and climb out of their coffins, out from the cold, dark earth into the light of a new day. Nothing—and I mean noth­ing— is impos­si­ble with God."

In a breath­less, pant­i­ng voice, he cried out, "Can I hear some­body say amen?" Spit­tle oozed from the cor­ner of his mouth.

His flock cheered, "Amen."

Eli crossed his legs. Uncrossed them. Released the preacher’s wife’s hand. Sat for­ward. Gripped the pew in front of him. As the preach­er con­tin­ued, Eli looked up at the ceil­ing and nod­ded. He rose from his seat and pat­tered down the aisle and out the dou­ble doors.

As the door closed behind Eli, the preach­er leaped onto the altar, glared with burn­ing, fevered eyes at the con­gre­ga­tion of sev­en­ty-five men, women, and chil­dren, and shout­ed, "Is that as good as you can do? Now let me hear you shout amen!”

His flock cheered loud­er than ever, “Amen!"

The preacher’s spir­it soared; he snort­ed like a dev­il blow­ing out smoke. He felt the fire burn­ing both inside him and over his head. In a craze, he felt it lift­ing him, lift­ing him high­er and high­er to greater things. He was no longer of the world.

With renewed ener­gy, he preached in a hoarse, cracked voice about the pow­er of God and the res­ur­rec­tion of Lazarus. He sprint­ed down the aisle, up and down, up and down. Twice he ran the length of the church, yelling his ser­mon to a con­gre­ga­tion hun­gry for mir­a­cles. With fiery eyes, he searched the faces of his flock. The preach­er took sev­er­al long, quick, delib­er­ate steps toward a woman near the front of the church. Her gray­ing hair hung like Span­ish moss down the trunk of her back. He placed one hand on the woman's fore­head and pushed her head back. Her fran­tic gaze scratched the ceil­ing. He called out, "Receive thy blessing."

A slow trem­ble took hold of the woman’s hands and arms, slith­er­ing over her body, rush­ing through her. She cried out in unknown tongues, a deliri­ous lan­guage of the Holy Ghost. Tears streamed down her face and dripped from her smil­ing lips.

The preach­er seared with wild mad­ness, rush­ing from one mem­ber to anoth­er, lay­ing anoint­ed hands on their heads, ignit­ing their souls as they spit out the mir­a­cle of unknown tongues.

Sat­is­fied, after pulling sob­bing prayers, the lan­guage of unknown tongues, and loud cries of praise from his mem­bers, the preach­er strut­ted back to the pul­pit. He wiped sweat from his face and spit from his mouth, whis­per­ing, “Thank you, Jesus, thank you, Jesus.”

As he brought the ser­vice to a close, the pianist rose and walked to the front. As she played, Just As I Am, the door opened and Eli stum­bled in, his pants and shoes cov­ered with red clay. In his arms, wrapped in his dark coat, he cra­dled a pack­age. He limped down the aisle, drag­ging his injured leg, leav­ing a trail of fresh dirt on the red car­pet. The preach­er watched the freak gimp past his wife, past the seat on the right where he sat every Sun­day, all the way to the pul­pit. He didn’t stop until he was at the altar, a cou­ple feet from where the pas­tor stood.

Eli looked up into the preacher’s face and smiled, lift­ing his facial scars upward, his eyes shim­mer­ing with faith. With his right hand, he pulled back the coat, reveal­ing the blue bun­dle cra­dled in the crook of his left arm.

The preach­er froze, his eyes fix­ing on the blue out­fit. As he rec­og­nized the birth­day suit, a roar­ing noise det­o­nat­ed inside him. He shook his head, as though try­ing to shake off a snake that had land­ed on him. A blast rever­ber­at­ed in his brain and screamed like a run­away death train plow­ing through his ears. The preacher’s face burst into a bril­liant, shock­ing shade of pur­ple. He fought to breathe, his fin­gers claw­ing at his neck, yank­ing at his chest. He burned from the inside out as though he’d swal­lowed the halo of fire that had hung over his head.

Eli dropped the coat to the floor and took a step for­ward, lift­ing the tiny corpse to the preacher’s face, offer­ing it up for a mir­a­cle. He slurred out one word: “Lazarus.”

Bren­da Sut­ton Rose is a visu­al artist and writer who grew up bare­foot and poor in south­ern Geor­gia. Her poet­ry, essays, and short sto­ries have appeared or are forth­com­ing in Fly­catch­er: A Jour­nal of Native Imag­i­na­tion and oth­er pub­li­ca­tions. She writes a blog, "Sweet Tea in South­ern Georgia."

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GOD DIDN'T GET ME NO WEED, by Mather Schneider

Posted on May 11, 2012 by Rusty

Me and Lit­tle John were sit­ting at the bus sta­tion behind the wheels of our taxi cabs. We were far, far down on the cab cue, so we wouldn't get a fare for a while. It was a depress­ing place to be, num­ber 9 or 10 on the bus sta­tion cab cue. It was about 4 in the afternoon.

Lit­tle John was on his cell phone. His 7 teeth flashed in the sun.“Hey, Don­ny,” he said into the phone. “What’s up? Where you been?”

He looked at me through our open win­dows and gave me the thumbs up.

“What?” he said. “No, no, man…Hey, is Jay there?… Where is he?…Don’t fuck around man, I’m com­plete­ly out, I mean

I had a cou­ple of buds stashed away for an emer­gency but those are gone now and…What?…No, hey, you know me, man, I can’t live like this. I AM A MAN WHO NEEDS HIS WEED! Ray? Ray? Hello?”

Lit­tle John looked at me again. “Fuck­er hung up,” he said. “He’s blow­ing me off, man. But I’ll get to him if I have to dri­ve this fuck­ing taxi all the way to fuck­ing Yuma.”

Lit­tle John was 5’6” and weighed 245 pounds. He had bad arch­es that caused him to walk with a stiff-legged lurch, but he hard­ly ever walked, he most­ly remained behind the wheel of his cab. He was most com­fort­able there, and had the appear­ance of being a phys­i­cal part of the vehi­cle. He was 47 years old with over-washed salt and pep­per hair that fell down his neck and onto his Neolith­ic fore­head. A wart poked its nip­ple-like head out of his right cheek and he had the habit of rub­bing it while he talked.

"Don’t smoke pot before you come to work,” the boss told Lit­tle John one time.

“Be rea­son­able,” Lit­tle John said.

“Well, don’t smoke at least 3 hours before work.”

“One hour.”

“Two and a half.”

They set­tled on two hours but Lit­tle John smokes through­out his whole shift any­way. He goes home and smokes a joint and then he’s back in his taxi, or he just smokes in his taxi.

But today he ran out of weed for the first time in years.

"I can't live like this," he said. "I've got to work, I've got to dri­ve this fuck­ing taxi, I've got to make mon­ey. I've got to deal with these peo­ple, all these moth­er fuckers…"

"Easy," I said. “God is listening."

"Fuck god," Lit­tle John said. "God didn't get me no weed."

"You hear me, moth­er fuck­er?" he said, lean­ing his head out his cab win­dow and look­ing at the sky. "Fuck YOU!"

He brought his head back inside the cab and looked straight ahead with a sigh. He sat there for a sec­ond. Then he gave me a wor­ried look, and put his head back out the window.

"Just kid­ding," he said to the sky.

Just then a black van pulled into the bus sta­tion park­ing lot. The hot sun reflect­ed off the shiny black paint. The van stopped and a mus­cu­lar tat­tooed white guy got out the back. Then the dri­ver got out, a fat white guy in a white shirt. He ran around the van and grabbed the first guy and start­ed beat­ing him in the face with his fist. He hit him about ten times, rapid­ly, and the guy crum­pled onto the ground. Then the guy got back in the van and drove off.

Lit­tle John jumped out of his cab and ran over to the guy on the ground. A cou­ple of oth­er cab­bies wan­dered over too. Lit­tle John bent down and helped the guy up, and then the guy tried to hit him. Lit­tle John pushed him off and the guy stood up and stum­bled away toward Broadway.

Lit­tle John walked back to his cab, defeated.

“Some peo­ple just don’t want help,” he said.

“Did you ask him if he had any weed?” I said.

“Don’t joke about it,” he said.

“Some­thing will come up.”

“Easy for you to say,” he said. “You’re a drunk. All you have to do is go to the store.”

“Except on Sun­days,” I said. “On Sun­days I have to wait until ten o’clock. We’re liv­ing in a police state.”

“Poor baby,” Lit­tle John said. “Poor god damned fuck­ing baby.”

“Yeah, yeah.”

“Shit, I got to get out of this city. I got to get back to the coun­try. I was raised in the coun­try, you know.”

He lit a cigarette.

“We used to have chick­ens, goats, pigs, all that,” he con­tin­ued. “That was the fuck­ing life, bet­ter than this shit­ty city. This place is fuck­ing dirty, man, and full of ass­holes. Plus, in the coun­try you can grow your own weed.”

“So what’s stop­ping you?” I said.

“I don’t know, I’ve got my apart­ment. Besides, how would I get money?”

A Grey­hound bus pulled into the sta­tion and emp­tied itself of peo­ple. A few of the cabs in the front of the cue got fares, and pulled away. Then the whole cue moved up and every­one got in their cars, moved 30 yards up, and parked them again.

“I had this one lit­tle chick,” Lit­tle John said, “on the farm. “Lit­tle fuzzy yel­low thing, and she grew attached to me. I named her Peep­ers. Damn, she was cute, man, you should have seen her, she would fol­low me around every­where I went.”

“How old were you?” I said.

“I was like 8 or 9 I think, yeah. Shit, Peep­ers, I haven’t thought about her in a long time. But it’s sad though, because one day we were run­ning through a field, and I was run­ning real fast, you know, and I guess she just couldn’t take it and she stopped. I felt bad and went back and bent over her and she was breath­ing real heavy and kind of twitch­ing in the grass. Jesus, I start­ed cry­ing. And then you know what happened?”

“What?”

“Her heart explod­ed! It fuck­ing explod­ed right out of her chest. Right out of her lit­tle fuck­ing chest.”

I gave him a look.

“I’m seri­ous, it did, explod­ed right out of her chest, there was blood on the ground, it was terrible.”

Lit­tle John seemed to go into anoth­er world and a tear fell down his cheek. He looked away and wiped it.

“Maybe you should just stay here in the city, big fel­la,” I said.

He shook his head up and down but he couldn’t talk any­more. The cab cue was dead.

“I’ve got to go,” I said. “I’ve got a personal.”

“Ain’t you lucky.”

I pulled out, to the delight of the cab dri­ver behind me. Every­thing starts with mov­ing, just keep mov­ing and the luck would change. It was like death just sit­ting there.

I drove over to the Food City by Ran­dolph Park and got a hot dog at an out­door stand. A Mex­i­can guy hand­ed it to me and it was loaded: beans, ketchup, mus­tard, mayo, onions, toma­toes, cucum­bers, cheese and bacon.

I was stand­ing there eat­ing the hot dog next to my cab in the bright sun when I saw a man run­ning toward me across the Food City park­ing lot, wav­ing his arm. He was lug­ging a suit­case and it was obvi­ous he need­ed a cab. Come to papa, I thought. He was run­ning like his heart would burst from his chest.

I was born in Peo­ria, Illi­nois in 1970 and have lived in Tuc­son, Ari­zona for the past 14 years. I love it here, love the desert, love the Mex­i­can cul­ture (most of it), and I love the heat. I have one full-length book of poet­ry out called DROUGHT RESISTANT STRAIN by Inte­ri­or Noise Press and anoth­er called HE TOOK A CAB from New York Quar­ter­ly Press. I have had over 500 poems and sto­ries pub­lished since 1993 and I am cur­rent­ly work­ing on a book of prose.

http://​www​.nyq​books​.org/​a​u​t​h​o​r​/​m​a​t​h​e​r​s​c​h​n​e​i​der

 

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Hill Tide, fiction by William Trent Pancoast

Posted on May 8, 2012 by Rusty

As Vio­let jos­tled among the church crowd and exchanged greet­ings, she tried to recall the sound of the spring that spurt­ed year round from the base of the hill behind the cab­in. But the voic­es and heat pre­vent­ed her from hear­ing any­thing but a hum­ming noise, as if every­thing around her were vibrat­ing. She was at the door shak­ing the minister’s hand.

“Glad to see you, Mrs. Tay­lor. You’re look­ing well.”

“Thank you,” she answered, and won­dered, as she was enveloped by the swel­ter­ing heat out­side, how she had come to be where she was at this very moment.

She walked slow­ly. A group of chil­dren played in a lot behind the Gulf sta­tion on the cor­ner. Deci­sions had shaped her path, caused her to be out this after­noon on a busy street in South Charleston that went for miles past ware­hous­es and fac­to­ries, and led final­ly into the hills, where she knew the smoky haze of the val­ley would be left behind. But every­one made decisions.

She con­tin­ued on her way, deep in thought. She was a thinker; the years of iso­la­tion in her big house had, if noth­ing else, caused her to spend many hours and days think­ing. But more often than not she felt as if she were in a maze, and that think­ing only led her deep­er into it. So it was now as she thought of her life. And what her mind told her, what it showed her about her life, was not much: only that every thought she had ever had and that every deci­sion she had ever made placed her, at this very moment, on this dingy street in the midst of the stink­ing chem­i­cal fac­to­ries of Charleston, West Virginia.

Then she was at the door of the big, white house. It was too large for her to take care of any­more. Once it had served a pur­pose, pro­vid­ing the room for her sev­er­al chil­dren, who were now pur­su­ing their own lives. One of them, the old­est, had become a doc­tor; anoth­er was an engi­neer. But they had all but for­got­ten her. The let­ters came sel­dom if ever, and the vis­its had stopped long ago.

As she opened the heavy, wood­en door and entered the old house, her thoughts were of the farm and the joy she had felt as a child grow­ing up there. She ate, and after sit­ting for an hour or so, men­tal­ly explor­ing what she could remem­ber of her child­hood, called her sister.

“Hel­lo, Myr­na. How are you?”

“Oh, I’m fine. But it’s so hot.”

“I was thinking…I’m going for a ride to cool off. Would you like to come?”

“What a grand idea.”

“Okay, I’ll pick you up.”

She grew excit­ed as she drove to Myrna’s. At least, she thought, she was break­ing the monot­o­ny of her rou­tine, that same­ness that made up her days. As she wheeled the old Chrysler through the famil­iar streets she sud­den­ly pic­tured her wiry, mus­tached father rid­ing the plow along behind the horses.

Myr­na was wait­ing on the porch. When she was in the car she sug­gest­ed, “Let’s dri­ve up to Cane Creek and see the Johnson’s.”

“No,” Vio­let answered quick­ly, “Let’s go down to the river.”

“What riv­er? The Coal or Kanawha?”

“No. Our river.”

Myr­na looked con­fused. “You mean down to the farm?” she exclaimed.

“Yes. That’s our riv­er. Wouldn’t you love to see it again?”

“I don’t think so…you know what Dad­dy said before he died. He said nev­er go near there. It’s all grown up and there nev­er was a road built past the farm.”

Myr­na was silent as they start­ed the ascent into the hills. At one curve a goat sat on a rock ledge over­look­ing the road. She was glad they were in the coun­try and, besides, she knew she couldn’t change Violet’s mind once it was made up. “Okay,” she final­ly said. “I’ll go, but only because…because I want you to see how fool­ish you are, always talk­ing about that des­o­late, old farm.”

Vio­let liked to see the cab­ins along the creeks, the saw mills, and the peo­ple. She even liked the dingy, skele­ton-like remains of the coal mines – at least they remind­ed her of things she had known when she was young. The city had no mem­o­ries to give her, she thought, envy­ing the peo­ple who sat on their porch­es in the shade of huge trees and who had moun­tains for back yards.

All after­noon they drove through small towns, com­ing clos­er to the farm their father had home­stead­ed after the Civ­il War. In the dis­tance, Vio­let saw a string of engines labor­ing their way out of the hills with a line of coal cars trail­ing behind and a mem­o­ry flashed: She and Myr­na and Per­ry had just come down the wag­on trail on their way to school. They had to wait for the train to go past on its way to the next sid­ing, which was near the school. Per­ry ran along­side one of the cars, and jumped for the lad­der, intend­ing to ride to school. But he slipped as his foot hit the frost-cov­ered rung. After he had recov­ered from the near fall, laugh­ter took the place of his fright, and clown­ing, Per­ry hung from the lad­der with one hand to show his sis­ters he wasn’t at all scared. Then came the jolt. Per­ry fell and the car skid­ded along the slick rails, sev­er­ing his legs. He writhed on the grav­el for a few moments before he lost con­scious­ness, and when Vio­let reached him, his blood-spurt­ing stumps were cov­ered with cin­ders. “Get Mam­ma!” she cried to Myr­na who stood in tears where she had been when Per­ry fell.

“Look out!” Myr­na cried as the car veered into the oth­er lane on a curve. Vio­let jerked the wheel to the right and bare­ly missed a car. When they were on a straight stretch of road, Myr­na said, “Let’s turn back.”

“Turn back! Why, we’re almost there.” She had to see the farm now, if only for a moment. She had to see the spot where Per­ry had died in her arms. She had to see things as they had been.

Vio­let drove sev­er­al miles south along the Tug Riv­er until they came to the bridge to Ken­tucky. There she stopped at a com­bi­na­tion gas sta­tion and church. “Hel­lo,” she said to the man who came out. “Can you tell me the best way to Lar­son Creek?”

He looked to his feet and stirred the grav­el with first one foot and then the oth­er. Brush­ing his mat­ted hair back, he squint­ed into the car. “What busi­ness y’all got there?”

“We used to live there. How long have you lived here?”

“Not long.”

“Oh,” she said, and since he had noth­ing of the past to share with her, asked again about the way.

“You kin go a mile or so down the Ken­tucky side,” he said point­ing to the bridge, “and walk the riv­er on the foot bridge. Or you kin go behind the place here and take the rail­road util­i­ty road.”

She thanked him, and they start­ed along the cin­der road along the rail­road. Shacks lined the bank. Many of the build­ings were desert­ed. In the inhab­it­ed ones, fam­i­lies sat on the lop­sided porch­es watch­ing Violet’s Chrysler intent­ly. Bare­foot chil­dren ran along behind in the dust until they were shout­ed back. Vio­let stopped at a shack that had a “Bar­ber Shop” sign on it. Two men sat on the porch drink­ing beer. She got out of the car to ask direc­tions and the men walked out to her. She looked close­ly at the taller of the two. “What’s your name?” she blurted.

“…Oapie.”

“Oapie…Oapie Wat­son!” she said upon asso­ci­at­ing the name with the man. He looked surprised.

“I’m Vio­let Taylor…Don’t you remem­ber me?”

He stretched his neck for­ward. “It’s been a long while, ain’t it?”

“It’s been so long I don’t even rec­og­nize much here,” she said look­ing around. “We’re look­ing for Lar­son Creek. As I remem­ber, it should be right around here.”

“About fifty yards fur­ther. You can’t see it. It’s all growed over.” He point­ed down the tracks. “Right where that big tree limb sticks out of the growth. That’s where Lar­son Creek goes under the rail­road.” The oth­er man went back to the porch where he care­ful­ly placed his emp­ty bot­tle in the top beer case. 

“Does any­body still live up the creek where our place was?”

“No, ain’t nobody been up there for years.”

“Well, we’re going up and look around,” Vio­let said, and turned to Myr­na, who sat look­ing straight ahead. “You remem­ber Oapie here, don’t you? Imag­ine, after all these years, Oapie’s still here!” Myr­na sat still, her lips drawn tight.

Oapie stepped for­ward as Vio­let turned to get in the car. “You don’t want to go up there. Snakes all over the place.”

“I used to live there. You can’t scare me with your snake stories.”

“Ain’t want­i­ng to scare you. But the strip­mine does it – they stir up the snakes and they come down here. I kilt one right here under the porch t’other day.”

“Well, I’ll take my chances,” she said, get­ting into the car. “Thank you, Oapie,” she called as she drove away.

“Let’s leave, Vio­let,” Myr­na said. “I’m scared of these peo­ple. They aren’t our kind anymore.”

“Non­sense.”

Myr­na looked back. The oth­er man had joined Oapie at the road where they stood star­ing after the car. “What are they star­ing at, then?”

Vio­let parked the car in front of an aban­doned shack and grabbed her cane off the back seat. “Are you com­ing?” she asked as she got out of the car.

“No, I don’t want to see it.”

She picked her way up the rail­road bed, crossed the tracks, and stood look­ing down the erod­ed bank of the creek. The water was mud­dy with traces of orange run­ning through it. Trees grew on the wag­on road her father had cleared. She looked ahead to the hill, before which would stand the cab­in. At the top were great bare spots, and scat­tered down the hill­side were huge rocks and piles of debris. Bri­ar patch­es, stunt­ed trees, and weeds cov­ered the fields her father had farmed. After a cou­ple more min­utes she could see the chim­ney, which she found was the only part of the cab­in still standing.

She heard a train whis­tle in the dis­tance and stopped. The riv­er was vis­i­ble below. A junked car pro­trud­ed from a shal­low spot. There was a grave­yard on the far bank. A fire had destroyed the cab­in. The barn still stood, but most of the sid­ing had rot­ted away. She had expect­ed to find things much as she had left them, but saw now that time had done its work.

Then she saw the spring and start­ed towards it to get a drink. She stepped over a charred log and felt some­thing sharp tear at her leg. She thought it was a bri­ar or a piece of barbed wire, but then she saw the cop­per­head. Drops of blood oozed out the tiny holes in her calf. She flung the snake away with the cane and went on to the spring. After a long drink she start­ed back.

She wasn’t wor­ried that she had been bit­ten; it wasn’t her first snake bite. But she felt dizzy after a few steps. She sat down on a large rock between the spring and the chim­ney. Feel­ing very tired, she lay down on the grass, aware of the spoilage and waste that lay all around. Yet she was glad to be here, and for the first time in many years, felt at peace. As she lost con­scious­ness she was a girl of ten help­ing her father feed the ani­mals late on a sum­mer evening, and the cool breeze that had picked up at the com­ing of dusk was wel­come after the heat of the day.

Myr­na had start­ed to fol­low Vio­let, but turned back before she had gone far. The train had come sud­den­ly and she had stood at the bot­tom of the wag­on road wait­ing for it to pass. As the heavy car­riages rum­bled past, she heard Vio­let scream­ing. What? “Get Mamma!”

Shak­en, Myr­na made her way back to the car. She watched for Vio­let to return along the creek bank until it was too dark to see any­thing. As night sounds and evening mist sur­round­ed the car, Myr­na began cry­ing soft­ly. She felt the cool air blow­ing down from the hills and smelled wood smoke, and won­dered how she had come to be where she was at this very moment.

 Hill Tide was first pub­lished in 1976 in The Moun­tain Call out of Ker­mit, West Vir­ginia, and again in Apple Mag­a­zine of Mans­field, Ohio, in 1978.

William Trent Pan­coast's nov­els include WILDCAT (2010) and CRASHING (1983). His short sto­ries, essays, and edi­to­ri­als have appeared in Night Train, Sol­i­dar­i­ty mag­a­zine, and US News & World Report.

 

 

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What He Asked, and How She Answered, fiction by Brian Carr

Posted on May 5, 2012 by Rusty

At the win­dow, with it open, as rain sang across the land once dry, so the rain slipped in threads of cur­rent down cracks and toward the lows, the man wiped his glass­es free of spray—beads that had hit the sill and splat­tered at him. He cleared his throat, put the glass­es back on, picked up a cig­a­rette weav­ing smoke into the pale-yel­low room—a light cast by a sin­gle bulb dan­gling above the kitchen table from a cord, makeshift.

“Would you say,” said the man now ash­ing his cig­a­rette, smoke stain­ing his words, his eyes toward the rain, “that I am very brave?” He then looked at a woman, wrapped in a blan­ket, her eyes tight against the chill, her body frail with age and labor, her hair winced gray by days. She tight­ened the blan­ket across her shoul­ders, leaned against a wall—faded white paint, cracked and spotting.

“These days?” she said, and looked now at the rain, sighed as if she knew it only came to wash her off the land, to hoist their home from its foun­da­tion in a tor­rent toward the death of it—nature rav­aging its boards and bones to splin­ters and shin­gles and scraps and refuse that would toss wild­ly in the breath of flood until it came to rest unrec­og­niz­able. She closed her eyes. Turned from the man. “I wouldn’t even call you handsome.”

These days the cou­ple bick­ered, made fights from moments oth­ers might let pass silent­ly, but in the past they would hold hands until the warmth of their palms birthed a slick­ness from sweat, but even then their fin­gers stayed clasped through the damp. They’d speak cute phras­es to each other—the man warm­ly coo­ing her name, the woman smil­ing when she heard him coo it. But that music had fad­ed from them.

 The man looked at the woman, nod­ded, said, “I’m ugly,” he said, “but ugly men can live bravely.”

 “They can,” said the woman, and she stayed silent a moment so only the sound of rain filled the room, and she looked at the man, lazi­ly blinked her eyes, smiled so slight­ly only she could sense it. “But I’ve nev­er seen it.”

 The man shrugged. He ashed his cig­a­rette mild­ly. He turned back toward the rain. They didn’t speak for a long time.

Bri­an Allen Carr's debut col­lec­tion Short Bus is out with Texas Review Press, and his next book, Vam­pire Con­di­tions, is out soon with Holler Presents, and it will play card tricks for you and hide your keys. He teach­es at Uni­ver­si­ty of Hous­ton-Vic­to­ria, and he wants you to visit. 


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poetry by G.M. Palmer

Posted on May 2, 2012 by Rusty

Sep­tem­ber

The night sweats through the humidity,
our human­i­ty exhaust­ed on the porch
col­laps­es from the draw of breath
through the thick Autumn air.
Steam and mos­qui­toes, blood and bile
are min­gling with the mist
of burn­ing cross­es, church­es, forests
as our spir­its are paved under
by car­pet­bag­ging revenuers
who wor­ship at the font of progress
while drown­ing our chil­dren in the water
meant for the improve­ment of man.

The morn­ing breaks at eighty degrees
as the sun strains through ancient oaks.
Pave­ment gravestones
mark the mem­o­ries of generations
blan­ket­ed in tar and steel and concrete
over the coquina sands of our ancestors
fed by the silent Aucil­la and cacoph­o­nous swamps.
Old men cypress­es are slaugh­tered for clocks,
their knees cut out from under them, choking
as their blood is leeched for anoth­er suburb
where timed rain beats the four o’ clock downpour,
and waters the ever­grow­ing asphalt.

The day beats in vol­canic reality,
smoth­er­ing all inten­tion and thought.
The fre­oned tint­ed cas­tles lord on,
the strapped Earth beg­ging for a hurricane
more crafty than the newest build­ing codes,
they con­tin­ue in their oblivion
as the alli­ga­tor stalks the cul-de-sac for anoth­er poodle,
and anoth­er child swims for the final time
as the marcite reflects the sun onto his face,
wait­ing for mom­my to return, arms full of bags
to won­der where the house­keep­er has gone
as her favorite soaps blast into the windows.

The evening drifts up from the glazed streets
after cars dis­ap­pear into cement caves.
Bare feet step out into dry­ing sand
to pick ripe toma­toes for dinner.
The sun sinks behind Span­ish moss
and a last ray dances through Depres­sion glass
to kiss the sim­ple ring that reach­es over the stove
to the spices that will kiss the wrin­kled recipe
that has defied the swell of the grow­ing years
and retains the taste of sink­ing into the fresh­est dreams.
Every native who has loved the soil and the salt
prays for peace with each day’s passing.

Rawhide

Stray dogs are rip­ping wid­owed paper bags.
Near­by lies a bro­ken heel; a leg out of place;
a skirt, hem slung around; a mouth that sags:
a hole in a yel­low, fad­ed, made-up face.

A mon­grel tears a strip of rawhide free
from a fad­ed bag. His teeth sink in the soft skin
as bit­ter drops fall from the balcony
where a girl is wring­ing out her clothes again.

His ears twitch, hit with the brown sinkwater
that pours from dirty panties. He turns his tongue
to lap the steady stream. The girl drops her
wet rags, cough­ing. He gnaws at the blood and dung.

The mon­grel drops his skin in the filthy light.
Her love is com­ing home to stay tonight.

G.M. Palmer preach­es, teach­es, and wran­gles chil­dren on an urban farm in North­east Flori­da. His crit­i­cism and poet­ry can be found through­out var­i­ous blogs and mag­a­zines, both in print and online. His chil­dren can be found through­out the neigh­bor­hood or at their
grandmother's house. His notes can be found on legal pads and spi­ral note­books. His busi­ness cards can be found with neat lit­tle poems on the back of them.

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Moon in the Holler, poetry by Gina Williams

Posted on April 29, 2012 by Rusty
A full moon is following me home. In the rearview mirror, it winks at me, an evil clown,
a psycho killer. Biggest in a hundred years. Old preacher says it’s a sign, predicts
earthquakes and insanity, says God and the moon are in cahoots to make us pay. Why
stop there? Let’s blame it for every little thing. Like fat kids, mean people, rheumatism,
annoying relatives, bad breath, broken pipes, toe jam, moldy bread. Mean, annoying
relatives with gum disease, rheumatism, bad breath, fat kids, broken pipes and toe jam
who serve moldy bread. Made me do it, made me kill my whole family, toppled the
house of cards, burst the artery that flooded the basement that gave me a wart that killed
the pig that gave me worms that stunted my growth. It’s not just for werewolves
anymore, so go ahead and get a slice of moon pie for yourself, while you have the
chance. Everybody’s doing it and it tastes like chicken. Gun the engine, skidding on the
gravel road, skeleton branches scraping the hood, deep into the thick pine woods where
the moon don’t shine, won’t follow, can’t be blamed for anything.

 

Gina Williams  lives and writes in the Pacific Northwest. She enjoys poetry, fiction and photography. She is a perpetual student, working towards a degree in Rough Arts from Life University. Writing, she has found, makes it possible for her to breathe.
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Retrieve, poetry by Michelle Askin

Posted on April 26, 2012 by Rusty

How did you ever think you would jus­ti­fy any­thing as good,
after aban­don­ing her for sweet prayer in a stone fruit orchard
or won­der­ful deed saints you held in the know­ing? How about
your holy hand to try art: cup­ping chopped off chick­en heads
from a prison’s con­struc­tion site grav­el. You paste them by 7Up
and propane bot­tles for pic­ture, for mean­ing. What sacrifices
could ever be more mean­ing­ful than that night at Hearty Stop In Grocery?
Tell me now why you left the house made of wire for an insane woman,
who rushed you to that store for dis­tilled water to pour in her breath­ing box
so she might sleep. Always when awake, the black wall­pa­per was a stove
where her rapist step father scald­ed her baby sis­ter to death.
She thought you were the father and sought to mur­der you as the father.
Thought you were the hook­er moth­er, who saw this hap­pen the way
one sees a movie hap­pen: up close but the sto­ry is far away.
She sought to mur­der you as the moth­er too.
The clerk would sell you win­ter squash and rifles for clearance.
But you kept say­ing water and no, no dis­tilled. And she just laughed
in her wart-wide mouth. Just said, Well Kroger has that.
The only Kroger around here is closed. You tried to run,
as noth­ing was fun­ny. As the clerk shot dead sil­ver wing butterflies.
And the room became traf­fic crash debris with fast rain falling over.

 

My poet­ry has appeared in The North­ern Vir­ginia Review, May­Day Mag­a­zine, 2River View, Oyez Review, The Sier­ra Neva­da Review, and elsewhere.

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Four Day Worry Blues, fiction by Murray Dunlap

Posted on April 23, 2012 by Rusty

Round 1:

I’m naked to the waist.  The first blow comes in low and fast.   I weave left, but his fist catch­es my right oblique.  I spit blood onto bare feet and upper­cut with my right.  I miss.  His jab catch­es my chin.  The room blurs and I step back.  The cross lands hard against my tem­ple.  I feel the wall at my back.  I feel glass break­ing against expen­sive art.  I feel the floor rise up to my knees.  Lean­ing for­ward, my sweaty fin­gers grab at the edge of the rug. The woolen threads feel soft.  My face press­es against hard­wood and glass.  I smell bour­bon.  The man but­tons down his cuffs and leaves the room.  It’s our first liv­ing room, the one before all the divorces and the step-this and half-that.  I have this dream every night.  Some­times the man is my father, some­times it’s Mason.  Most times I can’t see his face.  Either way, we go at it bare knuck­les.  This morn­ing, I wake up with bruised hands.

Round 2:

I duck down, step­ping back and block­ing with my fists. He comes in fast.  He lands two jabs, an upper­cut, and fin­ish­es with a cross.  I’m blind­ed by sweat and blood.  I cov­er my face, peer­ing between fin­gers.  It’s Dad tonight.  No, now it’s Mason.  The dream is always like this.  I shut my eyes.

            Mason lets me stay in his room the first night at the Uni­ver­si­ty.  Dad for­got to send board­ing fees.  No one knows where he is.  The guy assigned to live with Mason nev­er shows up, so things work out.  Mason and I have been best friends since mid­dle school. His hair turned gray senior year, so I start­ed call­ing him Gov­er­nor.  Then every­one did.  It was as much for the hair as for his pol­i­tics.  He wants to be JFK.  He keeps our room white-glove clean.  Mason’s father, who drove up for wel­come week­end, gives Mason an Oxford Eng­lish Dic­tio­nary.  He wraps thick, hairy arms around our necks and says Sewa­nee will make men of us.  I hear him remind Mason that his schol­ar­ship requires at least a 3.0.  Mason reminds his father that he was vale­dic­to­ri­an.  The father gives Mason twen­ty dol­lars. Through the crack of the bath­room door, I watch them hug.

The dorm is coed.  I walk the breeze­way over­look­ing the court­yard.  Heather steps out of her room in flip-flops with a tow­el over her shoulder.

“Have you tak­en the swim­ming test?” she asks.

Heather braids her pony­tail and looks at me with huge green eyes. A black bathing suit shows through her t‑shirt.

“A test?”

“The Uni­ver­si­ty says every stu­dent has to swim 50 yards.”  She spins gog­gles on a fin­ger. “They don’t want us to get drunk and drown in one of the lakes.”

“Oh,” I say. “I didn’t know.”

“The lakes are every­where. Lit­tle death traps when they freeze under the snow.”

“I swim all right.”

“I’m going now. Wan­na come?” Heather taps paint­ed toes. She smiles.

“Sure. I think so. Is the test in a lake?”

“Of course not. The cold would kill you.”

“But it’s only September.”

“Are you com­ing or not?”

Round 3:

I try a jab-cross com­bo but the man is quick.  The cross leaves me open and the man dri­ves a straight to my ribs.  I hear the stitch­ing rip in his starched white shirt.  I pull up, lift my fists.  He upper­cuts to my jaw.  Blood fills my mouth.  I can’t catch my breath and I can’t see clear­ly.  The man turns blur­ry and his next hit lands across the bridge of my nose.  I step back.  I hold out my hands in surrender.

I’m pack­ing for Mon­tana.  Dad said no, but I’m going.  Heather’s going too.  My can­vas bag looks like a split pota­to with clothes pop­ping from the seam.  I slide my fly rod into an alu­minum tube and fill a plas­tic box with Pheas­ant Tails, Zug Bugs, and Hop­pers.  Mason comes in from a mid-term and sits on his bed.  A poster of JFK is taped to the wall over his shoul­der.  Next to it, his auto­graphed pho­to of George Stephanopou­los. Our beds lie four feet apart in this tiny dorm room.  He rubs a hand under his jaw line.

“My throat is killing me.”

“You prob­a­bly pulled some­thing study­ing last night.  You should fix it up with a fifth of whiskey and dirty sex.”

“Seri­ous­ly, it hurts.”

“All that read­ing will do you in.”

“Grades equal money.”

“How long has it hurt?”

“A week now.  Are you going to hang that shirt up?”

“Does my nose look ok?  Took a soc­cer ball in the face.”

“I can’t see anything.”

“You should talk to the nurse about that throat.”

“I’ll see my doc­tor at home.” Mason picks at the hem of his khakis.

“What about the beach?”

“Can­celled.”

“What?”  I turn from my clothes and face him.

“I feel like shit.”

“Shake it off.  Be a man.”

“Bite me.”

Mason picks up my shirt and hangs it in the clos­et.  He opens our mini-fridge and grabs a coke.

“Whiskey, Gov­er­nor.  Not coke.  And I’m pack­ing that shirt.”

“I thought Mon­tana was off?”

“Why don’t you ever drink?”

“What about your Dad?”

“Who gives a damn. It’s not like he’ll remem­ber in a week.”

I turn back around, put my knee into the clothes, and press down hard enough to zip the bag.  My ribs throb with pain.

Round 4:

Heather stands between us.  She lifts both arms, palms out.  She push­es off my chest.  I move back.  But the man grabs her hand and twists Heather to the ground.  I watch his boot twist into her shirt as he comes after me.  I put every­thing into a straight and knock Dad’s teeth out.  But he gets up.  He sits in a Wind­sor chair and gums a bloody cig­a­rette.  Heather dis­ap­pears from the dream.  It hap­pens sometimes.

Dad says, “Got me good, did ya?  But you’ll nev­er get away.  Look at that hand.”  I look down at one of Dad’s eye teeth jut­ting from my knuck­le.  I pick it out and toss it to him.  In the dream, he pops it back in his mouth.

On the east bank of the Black­foot riv­er, Heather and I sit on a fall­en hem­lock. We’ve fished through the cold morn­ing.  Warm sun­light final­ly breaks over the tree line as I light two cig­a­rettes.  I pass one to Heather.  She moves to the water’s edge and bal­ances at the edge of a flat rock.  She flips up the creel lid and looks inside.  Two browns and a brook trout slosh in the frigid water.

“Should we release them?” she asks.

“I thought they were dinner.”

“We bought steaks.”

“Fine by me.”

Heather lifts trout one at a time.  She cra­dles their slick bel­lies under­wa­ter until instinct reminds them to swim.

“We should get a dog,” I say.

“What kind?”

“The big kind.”

“Like a Boxer?”

“No.”  I rub my thumb against my index and mid­dle fin­ger. “Pound dogs are free.”

“You wor­ry so much about money.”

“That’s because I don’t have any.”

“You’re rich.”

“Dad is rich.”

“What would we name it?” Heather throws the emp­ty creel onto the bank and fin­ish­es her cig­a­rette.  She grinds the butt against a rock and thumps it at me.

“Blue,” I say.

“Why Blue?”

“Why does he have to be such an asshole?”

“Booze.” Heather pulls a six pack from the riv­er.  She hands me one.

“Blue is a good name for a dog.”  I drink from my beer. “So when are you going to ask me about the fighting?”

“What fight­ing?”

Patch­es of sun­light flit across my hands and the cuts are hard­er to see.

“Yeah,” I say. “Blue.”

Round 5:

The man lands his first punch.  I shake it off, skip right, and work a com­bi­na­tion.  My jab nicks his chin.  He side-steps the cross.  Then he lands three for three and I’m spit­ting blood.  I try to call the fight, but my swollen tongue won’t pro­duce sound.  I duck under the har­vest table and stay to the shad­ows.  Bro­ken glass lit­ters the cold floor.  It smells like bourbon.

Mason’s not at the dorm when I get back, but the room is immac­u­late.  I unzip my bag and throw every sin­gle piece of cloth­ing on the floor.  I check the machine.  Two mes­sages from Mom and then it’s Mason:  Hey Ben. I’m still at home. I’m sure I’ll be back in a day or two. How was fish­ing? Call me.

I pick up the phone and dial.

“Gov­er­nor.”

“Ben.”

“Got your message.”

“Yeah.  It’s not good.”

“What’d they say?”

“They did a biop­sy on the lymph node in my neck.  Hurt like god-almighty.”

“Shit.”

“It’s Can­cer.”

I say noth­ing. I scratch at the back of my head and look around the room.  Fish­ing gear on the bed, skis in the cor­ner, and my bike hangs from the ceil­ing. Mason hard­ly owns a thing.

“Hodgkin’s Dis­ease.  That’s what they called it.  Said it’s treat­able.  No sweat.”

I tap the phone against my ear.

“You still there?”

“Yeah. I’m here.” I strug­gle for words. “Sor­ry, Gov.”

“It’s fine.  I’m fine.”

“I’ll come down there.  It’s only a cou­ple of hours.”

“Seri­ous­ly, I’m fine. How was fishing?”

I tap the phone against my ear.

Round 6:

I move in and upper­cut to his stom­ach with my right.  The man stag­gers back, bump­ing into the sil­ver tea ser­vice and top­pling the sug­ar bowl.  He spits to the hard­woods.  I see blood.  He’s angry now, but I still can’t see his face.  This time he throws a hay­mak­er.  I’m off my feet and falling fast.

Dad leaves the cabaret.  The high­way is dark.  He steers with his left hand and drinks ’82 Lafite Roth­schild from the bot­tle with his right.  “Hot­house,” he says. “Hell of a place.”  The wet black­top glit­ters under stray pock­ets of lamp­light.  Dad finds the replay of the game on the radio.  The Cubs are up by one at the top of the ninth.  He lis­tens to the Reds strike out as the right tires of the Mer­cedes stut­ter on cen­ter mark­ers.  The car drifts into the right lane.  He taps his thumb against the steer­ing wheel and clos­es his eyes.  The shoul­der grav­el vibrates the car and Dad wakes.  He over­cor­rects left.  The car cross­es both lanes and dips into the grass medi­an, pop­ping over the mud­dy ditch and climb­ing the oth­er side.  Dad looks into the glare of oncom­ing traf­fic as his car leaves the medi­an.  All four tires leave the ground.  The Mer­cedes’ front bumper hits first, shat­ter­ing glass and bend­ing met­al on the rear door of a tan Buick.  Both cars spin off the shoul­der and into the weeds.

A high­way patrol­man is first on the scene.  He calls in the ambu­lance and checks the Mer­cedes with a flash­light.  Blood runs from Dad’s fore­head into his open mouth.  He taps the steer­ing wheel with his thumb.

“Hey hey, Cub­bies,” Dad says.

“Sir, are you all right?”

“Chica­go wins again.”

“Do you know where you are, sir?”

“I’m in Ala­fuck­ing­ba­ma you lit­tle shit.”

“I see you’ve been drinking.”

“The ’82 is every bit as good as the ’59.”

“Don’t move Sir, para­medics will be here soon. I need to check on the oth­er car.”

The patrol­man jogs to the Buick.  He checks with a flash­light.  The woman in the driver’s seat slumps for­ward.  The child in the back screams.  The patrol­man feels for a pulse on the woman, then turns to wave the ambu­lance in.

At least, this is how I imag­ine it hap­pened.  I’ve talked to the cop.  I feel sure I have it right.

Round 7:

I come at him swing­ing.  I’m hyped up and punch­ing hard.  The man dances around my swings, grin­ning.  He bobs side to side, then lands a cross to my jaw.  The sting of it flicks a switch in my head and I rush him.   I shove him to the ground and kick his ribs.  The man curls into a ball.  I kick his face and sides, the back of his head.  I jump down and grip his shoul­ders.  I spit in his face.  The man keeps grin­ning as Heather pulls me off.  Even this close, I have no idea who he is.

Mason lies back in the ICU, head ele­vat­ed by pil­lows.  A ven­ti­la­tor breathes for him. Vase­line has been slathered in his eyes.  I’ve been told it’s a lose-lose sit­u­a­tion.  They can’t treat the Hodgkin’s for a virus in his heart and they can’t treat the virus for the Hodgkin’s.  The wait­ing room is crowd­ed with fam­i­ly and friends, but the doc­tor only allows us to say our good­byes one at a time. Mason’s sis­ters and moth­er talk us through it.  The old­er sis­ter says, “He can hear you, so say what­ev­er you want.”  I don’t know what to say.  On the night­stand, the moth­er tears open a white sug­ar pack for cof­fee.  Her hands trem­ble and less than half finds the cup.  She tears into anoth­er.  The younger sis­ter looks up to me, then turns to Mason.  She says, “Time to go play in the clouds, Bub­ba-cat.” At this, the moth­er cries.  I start to ask why she calls him Bub­ba-cat, but don’t.  I real­ize it’s time.  Mason’s moth­er hugs me, but can­not speak.  I stare over her shoul­der at the spilled sug­ar.  Mason’s moth­er kiss­es my cheek.  I move to the table and brush the gran­ules into my hand.  I make sure I get them all.  Then I nod to Mason and step out through the cur­tain so the doc­tors can turn off the machines.

Round 8:

I land two jabs and a cross.  The man takes one step back, then dri­ves for­ward with a straight to my nose.  I fall back­ward onto the antique butler’s tray.  Bot­tles of wine shat­ter under my weight.  I look up from the floor and see the man pick­ing through the shards.  It’s Dad.  He lifts a piece with the label still intact and reads from it.  “Intense­ly fla­vored with cas­sis, spice, and wood.”  He drops the glass and stands.  He cross­es his arms. Heather steps in from the kitchen and rush­es over.  She kneels in the wine and press­es two fin­gers against my wrist.  She’s say­ing some­thing, maybe even yelling, but I can only see her lips move and chin trem­ble.  I can’t hear a thing.

Dad gropes the sheets with shak­ing hands.  He kneads folds of thin fab­ric, releas­es, then kneads again.  Blood soaks through a ban­dage on his fore­head where the ’82 Roth­schild pierced his skull.  I’m the only one here.  I sit on a met­al fold­ing chair and look at the dull mon­i­tor screen, blip­ping with­out rhythm.  I glance at my hands, three band aids on the left, four on the right, then down to my leather boots.  I bought the boots years ago.  Just like Dad’s.  Same brand, same size.  A scuff on the right toe match­es one on the left heel where I kick them off.  I dig the right toe in between the leather and sole, send­ing the left boot to the floor.  Left boot, then right. Always in that order.  Dad does the same. The mon­i­tor squawks and I look up.

“Hor­ri­ble wreck,” the doc­tor says. “He may not make it through the night.”

I look at the doc­tor, expres­sion­less, then back at my father.   The tubes mum­ble and pulse.  I can’t think of any­thing to say, and instead, I begin to hum soft­ly.  My voice grows stronger as the hum­ming becomes words.  It’s an old blues bal­lad by Blind Lemon Jefferson:

Just one kind favor

                        I’ll ask of you

I sing loose and smooth, imi­tat­ing Blind Lemon as best I can. The nurs­es peer at me with side­long glances. They pre­tend not to notice.

One kind favor

                         I’ll ask of you

 

I keep singing.  I for­get myself and sing loud­ly, loud enough that I think Dad might hear.

Lord, it’s one kind favor

I’ll ask of you

 

The mon­i­tor emits a con­stant beep that I remem­ber from movies and dreams. I pro­duce the last line with air from deep with­in my lungs.

See

                         that my grave

                         is kept clean.

 

The doc­tor moves to Dad and checks his pulse.

“Sor­ry,” He says. The doc­tor clips the heart mon­i­tor back on to Dad’s fin­ger.  “False alarm.”

The machine resumes even beeps.

“Christ,” I say.

“These lit­tle clips are tricky.”  The doc­tor makes a rou­tine check of vitals, and turns to me smil­ing. But then his face changes.  His eyes open wide.

“You’ve got a hell of a nose bleed.”

I look down at my shirt, my pants.  Blood cov­ers every­thing.  I lift my head and hold my nose.

“Nurse,” he says. “Bring me some gauze, a towel.”

I stare at the ceiling.

“Don’t wor­ry son, your father’s turned the cor­ner. He’s a real fighter.”

“Christ,” I say.

I ball my hand into a fist.

Round 9:

Mason goes down in a sin­gle punch, but I’m not sure I threw it. He falls back, opens his eyes and says, “Look at Bub­ba-cat now, he sure ain’t the Gov­er­nor.”  He won’t get up.  I scream at him to get to his feet, but he lies side­ways on the floor.   He reach­es for a blan­ket on the couch and pulls it over his face.  Tables, chairs, paint­ings, and lamps lie in pieces around the room.  There is noth­ing left unbro­ken.  Heather stands behind me, so I turn to her.  She opens a new pack of cig­a­rettes and pulls two out.  She lights them with a match.  Music begins to play from some­where unseen, dis­tant and mut­ed.  But it’s enough.  Heather drops the match into spilled bour­bon as we walk through the door.

I say, “I’ve nev­er left this room.”

Heather says, “You have now.”

 ***

I stand out­side our crum­ble-stilts house, ten years since Mason died.  Crick­ets edge between blades of grass, hid­den, click­ing and chirp­ing the night song we all know.  My toes yawn out, press­ing into the cool and damp.  Alaba­ma moon­shine falls across the lawn and my hands slip into cot­ton paja­mas for a cig­a­rette and match.  Blue sniffs invis­i­ble trails, tail wag­ging and head down low.  His muz­zle turned gray last win­ter, and it’s hard to believe we’ve had him this long.  Heather drove us straight from the funer­al to the pound.  We sat on fold­ing chairs in a lit­tle square room and a woman brought pup­pies to us, one by one.  Blue had the biggest paws.  Today is his birthday.

We’ve just moved in to this house.  We’ve unpacked our box­es and we’ve done the clean­ing.  We do not feel like strangers in this house.  My grand­fa­ther built it.  The Chil­dress Riv­er winds along the back yard and dis­ap­pears south.  Dad jaun­diced when his liv­er gave way to tumors last year.  He sur­vived the wreck, but not the drink­ing.  He left all his mon­ey to a wife some­where, but we don’t know her.  Blue goes to the door and looks back to me.  His shoul­ders sit almost as high as the door­knob.  Above Blue, I see Heather through the screen.  She no longer smokes.  It’s hard­er for me.

The moon is clos­er to the Earth than usu­al.   The night is clear and I look up at the craters, piec­ing togeth­er eyes and a mouth.  I can’t make out much of a nose, and only when I squint does he take an appro­pri­ate shape.  In this light, my hands appear ivory white.  No cuts, no bruis­es.  Lead­bel­ly calls out to me from our win­dow.  It’s Four Day Wor­ry Blues.  I’m not sure if I’m awake, so I wig­gle my toes.  The grass feels real.  Crick­ets drop lay­ered chords into our song.  I glance down at the sil­hou­ette of garbage at the curb, box­es and bags of Dad’s clothes and cracked glass­es.  With all his belong­ings inside, the house felt clut­tered and dirty.  So I threw them out.

Look­ing back to the moon, I say, “Good­night Gov­er­nor,” and take a deep breath.  I put out my cig­a­rette and walk bare­foot to the house.  Blue fol­lows me in.  Heather is already asleep, and I slip into bed with­out wak­ing her.  I watch her eyes dart side to side under closed lids.  It’s warm here and I’m tired, so I make a fool’s wish.  I put an arm around Heather.  I shut my eyes.  I wish to sleep with­out dreaming.

Mur­ray Dun­lap's work has appeared in about forty mag­a­zines and jour­nals. His sto­ries have been nom­i­nat­ed for the Push­cart Prize three times, as well as to Best New Amer­i­can Voic­es once, and his first book, "Alaba­ma," was a final­ist for the Mau­rice Prize in Fic­tion. He has a new book,  a col­lec­tion of short sto­ries called "Bas­tard Blue," that was pub­lished by Press 53 on June 7th, 2011 (the three year anniver­sary of a car wreck that very near­ly killed him…). The extra­or­di­nary indi­vid­u­als Pam Hous­ton, Lau­ra Dave, Michael Knight, and Fred Ashe taught him the art of writing.

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light year ghazal by Dennis Mahagin

Posted on April 20, 2012 by Rusty

Oh, I can hear the crick­ets swarm, on warm star­ry nights harping
rhap­sodies: it's as if their surf-like sighs might span even light years.

When fire­flies … get the act togeth­er… right? Teach­ing rainbows,
jel­ly fish, mete­ors' moons and tides: how to flu­o­resce in light years.

A hypo­thal­a­m­ic fil­a­ment that crack­led ( zzzzzzzzzzzt ) when cordite
split the banyan: ablaze from heights of light, a can­dle made of years.

I won­der if Sagan or Hawk­ing knew how lone­li­ness felt to a comet
in Orion's belt, hump­ing its own tail; oroborus for a mil­lion light years.

Yes, all the rage, all the rage when men begin to gauge dis­tance via
Time; as dot­ted lines on a free­way flit … in end­less fits of white years.

In oth­er words what angels say, sot­to voce, tan­gled up with hopeless
recidi­vists: in one ear: LIGHT; the oth­er might take many, many years.

Den­nis Maha­gin is a poet from east­ern Wash­ing­ton state. His writ­ing appears in Exquis­ite Corpse, 3 A.M., 42opus, Stir­ring, Absinthe Lit­er­ary Review, Prime Num­ber, Juked, Smoke­long Quar­ter­ly, Night Train, Pank, Sto­ry­glos­sia, and The Ner­vous Break­down. He's also an edi­tor of fic­tion and poet­ry at Frigg Magazine.

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Rooster Slaughter Day, essay by Dena Rash Guzman

Posted on April 17, 2012 by Rusty

Part 1

(I Return In Muck Boots)

Wait­ing for the slaugh­ter with Ines and her daugh­ter, I have exhaust­ed my Spanish.

They are here to con­duct the killings. We are culling our flock.

"Hola. Mi hom­bre es Dena. Soy un Dena. Mi nino hom­bre esta Jackson."

Ines wants to know if I speak Span­ish. She asks me this in rapid-fire Spanish.

“No.”

“Ah,” says Ines. Ines looks at her daugh­ter. Her daugh­ter asks me some­thing I do not under­stand. Ines asks me again, for her daugh­ter. She asks me slow­ly, with few­er words. I still can­not understand.

I try to tell her my son is Puer­to Rican and that he is hap­py to assist with the roost­er slaugh­ter. The state­ment is out of con­text, in Eng­lish, and not at all under­stood. Ines smiles at me.

In Span­ish, Ines asks my son’s age. For a moment, I can’t remem­ber. Once I remem­ber, I can’t remem­ber how to say eleven in Span­ish, so I hold up ten fin­gers and then one. In Eng­lish, Ines says eleven.

Silence comes to silence the lit­tle room. We wait for the water to boil so the slaugh­ter can begin. Six roost­ers are about to die. My first slaugh­ter. Before this, I’ve only seen bugs and one cat die. I look at my hands.

I look at the women’s shoes: Ines in red can­vas shoes and her daugh­ter in blue suede sneakers.

I won­der if the blood will stain them. Ines and her daugh­ter are look­ing at my shoes. They are yel­low suede san­dals and I know the blood will stain them.

I beg their par­don. I run across the farm into the house.

Part 2

(Lan­guage Failed Me and Fails Me Again.)

In shoes that will repel blood splat­ter, I return to the shed.

Roost­er num­ber one, head hon­cho, is already dead.

I don’t mourn him. He sin­gled me out for the first attack last fall. Many oth­ers were attacked by him after me, but he took me first.

He got me by the mail­box from behind, mount­ing me like he’d mount a chick­en and leav­ing a per­ma­nent scar on my back. My third scar ever, only.

I am new to the coun­try. I was a sub­ur­ban girl. These are my first chick­ens. These are my first woods, my first closed-in sky, my first rain­for­est. I had no bear­ing. I asked why.

Did he think I was a chick­en? A coy­ote? Anoth­er rooster?Did he know I said I thought he moved like an inse­cure Mick Jagger?

“Yes.”

Roost­er, strut no more.

The chick­en yard is a war zone when there are too many roost­ers. They rape like it’s a war crime.

Bosnia. Con­go. I can hard­ly look. They don’t stop. They mount and mount, leav­ing bald spots and scars on the backs of the female chickens.

I think of the poul­try world, in which birth con­trol means killing the men or smash­ing eggs or slaugh­ter­ing hens. I think of the human world. I think, “We all are made of stars.”

One down.

I’m less relieved and more sad­dened when the big, sweet, gold­en one goes. Ines takes a broom and places his neck beneath it. She steps on the han­dle on either side of the neck. She pulls the rooster’s body away from its own han­dle-trapped head until the roost­er stops screaming.

Snap. He slow­ly stops flap­ping. He has stopped his fighting.

Two down.

Three.

Num­ber four, the roost­er that looks like a turkey vul­ture, doesn’t die right. The broom doesn’t snap his neck. It kind of injures it and there is blood and the roost­er screams. Pan­ic fills the the shed. We don’t want the roost­ers to suf­fer. This is an organ­ic farm. We have to kill them to pro­tect the flock but we don’t want them to suf­fer any more than their fate strict­ly requires. His neck is some­how placed back under the broom despite his writhing and rallying.

Snap.

Four down. One to go.

The fifth one gets away–he’s live­ly. He’s small. He’s the son of the son of a gun that jumped me. They look near­ly exact­ly alike, but Junior has far more spir­it. The three of us give chase. I’m no help. The oth­er two cor­ner him. The farmer catch­es him. The roost­er tries to beat him, goes for his eyes. He tries to fly back over the farmer’s head but the long, tall farmer’s arms prevail.

This roost­er screams the loud­est. Tini­est, but he had the most fight.

Eddie the farm­hand says, “Adiós, amigos.”

I think, “Too many roost­ers are not good for the hens. They eat food and don’t lay. They are extra­ne­ous. Every good farm has to cull the flock. It’s not bar­bar­ic. This is part of rais­ing meat ani­mals humanely.”

I don’t close my eyes or scream. I only imag­ine myself doing it.

Ines. Broom. Snap.

Five.

It is done. The clean­ing starts. The boil­ing water is used. The feath­ers are pulled out. Ines and her daugh­ter held the roost­ers like babies. The farmer did too. I have a pho­to­graph of him hold­ing one, and there’s noth­ing but kind­ness and curios­i­ty in the farmer’s eyes.

You can’t see the rooster’s eyes. I nev­er looked that day at their eyes.

They held them before they killed them to keep them calm. This was not cru­el, this slaugh­ter. It was as humane as it could have been but still, I feel tired and go inside, leav­ing my son to help clean the feath­ers and butch­er the roost­ers. He goes all the way. I can bare­ly speak. I have bare­ly spo­ken at all for the past hour. Feath­ers and cot­ton­wood drift across the land­scape as I walk home.

Part 3

(I fin­ish my wine and feel lucky to be alive.)

I’ve nev­er seen any­thing but a bug killed before.

We didn’t kill them for food. We killed them for being out of place. We killed the roost­ers for being out of place, but we will eat the roosters.

The boil­ing water, the feath­ers, the broom handle–all in their places now. The blood scrubbed up. The roost­ers are in bits. Look­ing in the bag of roost­er parts, I can’t tell which roost­er is which.

I hope I have at least part of the mean one.

Over at the main farm­house, they’ve already made coq au vin. I ask my friends what I should make. I look for recipes. I decide on Greek style roost­er stew. To make a roost­er edi­ble, it must be cooked slow­ly in liq­uid. Roost­ers are gamey, tough things. Same dead as liv­ing. I use toma­toes, olives, wine, spices and stock. I talk to my Greek friend and tell her my plan while the roost­er is sim­mer­ing. There are claws and even a neck and head in the stew. If I were to try to make a roost­er pup­pet out of these pieces, it would be a Franken­roost­er. There are three thighs, one wing, part of a rib, a neck, a head and three claws.

I don’t think the neck will be edi­ble but I use all of it.

My Greek friend is excit­ed and tells her mom about my din­ner. She calls me because her mom says, “Serve orzo.” The stew is on the back burn­er, sim­mer­ing on low. I dri­ve the 20 min­utes to the near­est town and get orzo. I become addict­ed to orzo for the next ten weeks.

Din­ner time. I wished I had a big tri­an­gle to ring. I wished I had a long prairie dress and a long apron. I wished my hair was in a bun like Ma’s on Lit­tle House on the Prairie. Hell, I wished I had a fan­tas­tic Bono lion’s mane like Pa’s.

I wished I had sev­er­al kids run­ning in, school books hang­ing off a leather strap, no shoes because it’s warm out and shoes are for cold weath­er. It’s not even rained here for a cou­ple of weeks. There’s not even mud. I wished for blue tin plates. I pour the last of the wine into my own lit­tle glass.

Sev­er­al of the farm work­ers come over. They set­tle in. They’ve already had the coq au vin and are ready to see what’s next. I serve up peas, Greek roost­er stew, green sal­ad and orzo.

My son is served some meaty pieces of roost­er, but asks for a foot and the neck. He starts try­ing to bite through the neck. Tim the Woods­man, who lives back in the groundskeeper’s cot­tage and fix­es every­thing from the green­house glass to air­planes, goes sen­ti­men­tal and speaks of his child­hood on a farm in the mid­west, eat­ing roost­er and rab­bit and of the won­der­ful things his moth­er did with win­ter squash.

Roost­er is all mus­cle, high in pro­tein at any rate, and our roost­ers were tru­ly free range. They had nev­er been in cap­tiv­i­ty of any sort. They had for­aged, wan­dered and bat­tled coy­otes their whole lives. They were cham­pi­ons of the flock. Nec­es­sary but in the end, expend​able​.At night they slept in one of the unused green­hous­es or roost­ed up on the sec­ond floor bal­cony of the farm’s old admin­is­tra­tion building.

The men exclaim over the fla­vor of the sauce, but no one real­ly likes the roost­er. My son and his father claim to, but they look sto­ic and hard­scrab­ble try­ing to chew the meat. I stewed it for hours and still, it didn’t pre­cise­ly melt off the bone. It’s free range roost­er. It’s noth­ing like a frozen chick­en breast.

I lis­ten and take in their silence and inter­est. This is the first time I’ve ever watched roost­ers and chick­ens live and grow. They came from eggs laid on the farm. I saw each of them as a baby. I saw them before we could tell their sex. I saw them mount and men­ace the flock, and felt one mount and men­ace me.I helped round them up ear­ly on, when they were lit­tle, cry­ing “Chick, chick, chick­ens!” Then I helped kill them, and cooked them.

I can’t bring myself to eat the roost­er. Maybe next time. The chick­ens are not pets, because you can’t eat your pets, but my attach­ment to them boils over, and I detach. I look around me at all these men and think of them being culled. I rear back, shaken.

That’s enough for one day.

 

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