An Ashtray in Church

        I hadn’t slept in twenty-seven hours, and at the time, church seemed like the logical place to be. My mind and body were mired in that haze that comes from the toxic mix of deprivation and depravity. A haze I knew all too well. A haze in which objects are rimmed with fuzz and everything seems to be going way too fast to keep up. And, at a certain point, the mind just stops trying. When that happens, the world moves like a time-lapse film in which portions are completely skipped over in order for the overall picture to maintain some semblance of reality. This can be dangerous. But for some reason, at these times, the awareness that the world beyond my eyes is, in fact, not the same world I am seeing behind my eyes, can be, in some ways, exhilarating.  
        I wandered to a pew and slid to the end, closest to the wall. The place was filling up fast. The people were dressed in their Sunday best. I was still in my Saturday best; but no one seemed to notice. I didn’t get many looks my way, a few side-ways glances, but mostly just pure, unadulterated avoidance.
        I imagine I stunk a bit. A bit like Wild Turkey and shame. And these people could smell the shame like blood in the water. Vicious beasts. I wondered if they could smell the Wild Turkey too. No one said. They kept out of my parameter. And I kept out of theirs, for that matter. 
        Personally, I didn’t think I looked that bad. But the crowd told a different story. I happened to be wearing sunglasses, and it seemed to frighten them. People who can be trusted do NOT wear sunglasses, especially not in church. But, in my defense, I wore them simply to hide the fact that my eyes were a deep shade of crimson. Were proper sunglasses not better? I certainly didn’t want to frighten the children with glazed and bloodshot eyes at this hour of the morning, not in church. I believed I should be commended for that.
        The people ignored me and found their seats and came to a startled hush moments later as a tall priest came out before them. He was a dandy. I judged him to be at least eight feet tall, with a head like the Rock of Gibraltar. Just the sight of him made me shrink. 
        I was pretty sure I was in a catholic church, but there was no way to be fully sure. I looked around for clues, but that was a pointless exercise in futility; my heathen lack of theological acquaintance prevented me from being able to accurately propose any substantive answers to my theory. Whatever the church was, I had been in it for about an hour at that point and I was starting to wonder why the hell I had come there. It seemed like a good idea at the time, but now I just wanted a cigarette. The priest was starting to speak and I looked around. Could I just leave? I thought about it. Not a chance. For sure they would wrangle me and lash my hands and feet behind my back and drag me to the front of the cave to drain my blood on their altar in a feverish sacrificial orgy.
        Good God, I thought, get it together. The lack of sleep was getting to me; my brain was turning to mush. I needed sleep. I needed sleep badly. But I was boxed in, cut off from the outside world. I looked around in a panic. What if I dozed off here? What would happen? My eyes darted around. I absolutely could NOT fall asleep here, that much I knew; they would no doubt castrate me before I could wake to defend myself.
        Now people were looking, only a few. They heard me think the word castrate and their senses stirred. I slowly slid down in my seat and kept a watchful eye on the anxious mob surrounding me. I would have to wait it out lest these animals quench their thirst for blood. I must keep up my guard. How long would this thing last? I looked at my watch. The battery had stopped working months ago. Damn.
        At this point, the priest was warmed-up and finding his oratorical stride, belting out a masterpiece about a river of pestilence and mortal sin, or something like that. I must admit, he had quite a way about him. As I settled in, I listened closely to his sermon. As closely as I could in my current state. He was tall and broad with thinning black hair combed straight back. He looked like he might be a Mafioso if he weren’t a priest. Maybe he was both. The people were certainly mesmerized and I too was enjoying his style. But, even so, I could feel my eyelids getting heavy. Was this the end?
        Then I saw it, to the far left of the altar, in a dim, possible overlooked corner of the church. There, seemingly unnoticed, sat a table, and on that table sat an ashtray. It was clear glass and there were ashes in it, I was close enough to see that much at least.
        I was taken aback. What the hell was an ashtray doing in the corner of the church? I looked up at the priest, then back at the ashtray. There was probably some perfectly proper explanation for its appearance. I thought of what that could be. There were ashes in it, and that fact alone ruled out matchsticks for candles and most other innocent explanations. I strained to see if the ashes were large like a cigar or small like a cigarette, but I couldn’t tell.
        The priest was really raving now and I looked back up at him. I stroked the twenty-seven-hour-old stubble on my chin and furrowed my forehead in thought. I had stumbled upon quite a mystery. I grinned and looked down the pew at a small white-haired lady, raising my eyebrow. She looked nervously at me from the corner of her eye, not knowing what to make of the troubled man with the sunglasses grinning at her. I was convinced she had something to hide. I would let her sweat it out.
        I returned my attention to the ashtray. Ah, the ashtray. The ashtray sat on a folding card table. It was evident that someone must have forgotten to put it away. The whole scene reeked of conspiracy.
        I looked to the right at the organ player. It didn’t take much study to recognize that he was missing notes from time to time. Poor playing perhaps. But on review, apart from the missed notes, he played a mean organ, he was certainly no amateur. I looked at his face. There was something there. His gaze was unseeing, drifting about the wall above his organ. His shoulders slumped in defeat. It was obvious that his mind was elsewhere, somewhere dark and stressful. He was no doubt very worried about something. What was it?
        As I pondered this, my gaze landed on the sisters behind the altar. They, too, carried blank looks, down at the floor. They were paying no attention to the sermon of the priest. And it was a hell of a sermon. When it came time to stand for one thing or another they would be the last to rise, only after noticing the other folks rising. Hmmm. If I didn’t know better I would believe that they probably felt about like I did right then.
        But where was this all leading?
        My prying eyes again fell on the ashtray. What had transpired here? What madness was hidden within that inanimate object? It was obvious to see that the organ player and the sisters were in rough shape from one thing or another. And a used ashtray was hiding in the corner of the church, dying for its story to be told. This couldn’t be a coincidence.
        I thought back to when I arrived, early, about an hour before mass started. The place was empty at that point. I tried to think of when I first saw the sisters. It had been shortly after I arrived. Yes, because the doors opening startled me. They came in through the front doors. I didn’t think much of it at the time, but now it made me wonder. And, wonder, I did. Why would they be coming in the front? Do the nuns not live in the back? How the hell would I know? Straining to remember, I recalled them hurrying in and shuffling straight to the back rectory, keeping their eyes on the floor. Do I remember seeing Mardi-Gras beads? Or was it a rosary? I couldn’t be sure. And now the appearance of the mysterious ashtray. What kind of sin?
        A rousing outburst from the priest awoke me from my rumination. He was really cruising along. I again stroked the stubble on my chin and studied his face. The bags under his eyes told a story of sleepless nights, and his collar was loose, his forehead glistening with sweat. But he preached with a fervent vigor. He had rocket fuel in the tank no matter what his outward appearance.
        But it made me wonder what kept him up at night. Worry? Concern? Or was it guilt? As I studied deeper I began to believe that he was no stranger to the sleepless nights that currently ailed him. The creases in his face told of hard times. What stories lay behind those wrinkles? That he had something to do with the mysterious ashtray, I immediately had no doubt.
        I searched for other clues. The table rested near an alcove at the back of the church. At first, it looked like the only thing in the alcove was a tall bookcase filled with shelves of books. Then I noticed three folding chairs rested sloppily against the corner of the bookcase. Maybe I was looking too far into it, but it sure looked to me like those chairs were not there for long-term storage. They had been hastily placed there recently. Were they the chairs for the folding table that held the ashtray? No doubt. But there was one chair that was still unfolded, sitting beside the table. Why the one still out? And what of the other three? Four chairs. Does that mean four culprits? When were the three put away? Before the ashtray, or after? And why so hastily stowed? The conspiratorial winds were rising. These questions demanded answers; and I was just the man to answer them.
        To my right, the old lady was looking at me again. This time she didn’t even try to hide it. She knew I was on to something. But how did she fit in? Or did she fit in at all?
        I was pondering these questions when the priest called for the people to come up and drink the blood of Christ and eat the flesh of Christ. I sat up with a start. Did I hear him right? The reference to cannibalism was the last thing my mind needed right then. Something wasn’t right here. Is this what happened in church? Now the people were all lining up to perform this weird vampiric ritual. And the priest seemed to revel in the consumption. Was it the thought of blood, or the taste of wine? Good God, I thought, I was expecting a refuge, not this kind of madness.
        The people all seemed to be looking at me as they returned from the blood-drinking. As if they had gotten a tease, and now wanted the real thing. I sank deeper into the pew and covered my throat. Oh, God. I knew it was only a matter of time until they descended.
        But then a thought occurred to me. People were moving up and down the aisle, coming and going from the altar. There was confusion. In this melee, brought on by all the consumption of human flesh and blood, I had my opening to escape. I could enter the fray, then make a run for the doors and hope nobody noticed. Most of the flock was old and white-haired anyway. At least they appeared to be. Who knows what was hiding under their wrinkled skin. Surely, they wouldn’t be able to catch me, though. Right? The lady at the end of the pew told a different story. But she was just one.
        I weighed my options. It was now or never. I glanced around. But I didn’t move. This was a tough decision. If I left now, I would never solve the mystery of the ashtray. And my senses told me I was right on the heels of that elucidation. But, at the same time, I knew I would never be allowed to leave with the truth. I probably wouldn’t be allowed to leave no matter what. These beasts had the scent of human blood in their nostrils. I was doomed.
        I made my decision in the blink of an eye. Without a second to lose, I leapt to my feet and tore off my jacket. With a shriek for distraction, I threw my jacket over the head of the old lady at the end of the pew to buy myself some time. Then, without hesitation, I sprung over the pew in one fluid motion. But the row behind it was blocked as well. I hurdled the next pew and the next after that until I finally reached an empty row. Without pause, I made a dash for the aisle before the mob could cut off my exit. As I made the turn into the aisle, I barreled over a beast disguised as an old man and he went sprawling backwards, head over heels. I didn’t stop to look back; I knew they were coming for me. But, in front of me, there was nothing but daylight between myself and the front door.
        I ran for my life.

THE END

Jar of Change

            Frank's heart was racing and his hands were sweaty. He tried rubbing them on his pants but knew it would not help.  It was so damn hot.  And the air conditioning in his car had stopped working years ago.  The orange needle of the gas gauge hovered just above the Empty line and the little gas-pump shaped light was on beside it.  He took a deep breath and exhaled slowly, trying to slow down his heart and calm his nerves.  His belt felt tight around his waist and his shoes were awkward on his feet.  This was only the second time he had worn them.

            “Make your own way with Festiva Cruise Lines,” the ad on the radio played through nearly muted speakers.  Frank rubbed his head.  He was just past his thirtieth birthday and he could see his hairline receding in the rearview mirror. 

            “Jesus, Frank.  Get it together,” he implored himself.  This was not the time for a loss of confidence. 
            He thought he looked rather sharp in his blue shirtsleeves and grey slacks.  The slacks he had purchased at JC Penney about three years before; but with his new belt and shoes, the pants looked brand new.  He had spent extra time on the crease this morning while ironing.  Now the heat was making him sweat through his shirt and causing his pants to wrinkle.  He tried to push those petty thoughts from his mind and focus on the task at hand.  There was nothing he could do about the heat; his air conditioning was broken.  

He leaned forward in his seat to look again in the rearview.  Everything seemed in order; he was as presentable as he was going to be. 

“Go get it, man!” he spoke to the man in the mirror, trying to bolster his confidence.  In a burst of motion he turned off the key and stepped out of the car.  Straightening his belt he stepped toward the grey building quickly, as if he knew that he only had moments of positive energy of which to make use.  The day was hot and the sun made a bead of sweat sizzle down his forehead. He wiped the drop of sweat with the back of his hand being careful not to moisten his sleeve.

As he reached the glass double doors, Frank could see himself in the reflection walking up, and again, everything seemed in order.  There was no toilet paper trailing from his shoe or anything like that.  At the double door, he paused for just a moment before pulling the left door open and stepping inside.

The air-conditioning in the building engulfed him the moment the door closed behind him.  The cool air felt amazing.  It had been a long and hot drive down to this place.  The sweat on his forehead cooled and dried-up almost instantly.  Frank surveyed his surroundings and noticed that the people moved around the refreshing air of the building with purpose.

In front of him, a pretty lady in a fashionably loose-fitting ivory colored blouse and tight black business skirt that accented her long legs stepped behind the sleek reception desk with a small stack of loose papers in her hand.  Behind the desk, glass walls and doors showed an office in motion.  The workers appeared confident and intelligent.  He didn’t notice any dullards or slobs and everyone appeared to be on a driven mission.

“Can I help you, sir?” the receptionist asked in a friendly but businesslike tone as she set the papers down in front of her and sat in the ergonomic chair.

“Hello, how are you?” Frank responded.  “Yes you can.”

“I’m fine thank you,” she replied with a smile, “how may I help you?”

“I would like to talk to someone about a job,” Frank stated.

“Did you have an appointment?”

“Uh, no…I have this résumé,” he stammered.

“Okay,” she smiled, “I’ll take that down to Noreen.  If you would like to have a seat someone will be with you shortly.” 

Frank handed her the résumé and tried to present himself well while she stood and turned toward the buzzing office.  As she stepped through the glass doors Frank turned and strode to the futuristic plastic chairs positioned beside the front door. 

He sat and tried his best to look smart.  In a few minutes, the pretty receptionist returned and took her seat.  She smiled at him as she sat down and returned to her work.  There was traffic going into and out of the building and Frank tried to nod to each passing employee in the sternly businesslike manner he had seen his father use while making business deals down at the marina.  He tried to keep his posture and even crossed his legs, holding his knee in his woven fingers.  Five minutes went by like this and then fifteen and Frank continued to sit up straight in his chair and nod to each person whose eye he caught.  His butt was starting to hurt.  He wanted to slouch.

After twenty minutes, a woman in her mid-thirties came out from behind the glass doors and walked toward Frank.  She was holding his résumé in her hands and approached him with a smile. 

Frank smiled as broadly and charmingly as he could and stood up.  He thrust out his hand.  “Hello, Frank Dickens,” he stated in a deep businesslike voice as she accepted his handshake.

“Noreen Roberts, nice to meet you.”

Frank took a half-step toward the glass doors from which she had come, expecting to be led to her office so they could talk.  But then the woman sat down beside the chair on which Frank had been seated for the previous twenty minutes.  Frank quickly stepped back and sat down in his chair, the woman smiled warmly at him and looked down at his résumé.

“I’m sorry it took me so long to get out here,” she apologized as she looked up, “I was on a very important phone call.”

“No problem,” Frank responded with a friendly smile, “I didn’t even notice.”  He felt like he was presenting himself well.  He was sure that if he made a good impression he would be well on his way to getting the job.  He smiled cordially and looked her in the eyes like his father had taught him.

“I just felt bad,” she said looking down at his résumé, “because I assume you are looking for our warehouse and they have their own Human Resource department.”

Frank was taken aback. “Uh, no ma’am,” he felt his cheeks turning red, “I was applying for a job in the office, maybe sales.”  His confidence was draining like a pool with a ruptured lining.

Now she was the one who was surprised.  “Oh, I’m sorry, I just assumed,” she paused for a few seconds to gather her thoughts.  “Okay then, let me see…” she looked down at his resume.  “Do you have a college degree?”

“No ma’am, but I received straight A’s for all of high school,” he had expected this to be brought up and thought he could talk his way through it.  But, he hadn’t expected to have to make his pitch in the busy lobby of the building.  He stammered a little.  He shifted uncomfortably. 

The pretty receptionist was looking over at him.  He thought he saw pity in her face as his eyes caught hers for a split-second.  He was starting to sweat again despite the cool air-conditioning.  This wasn’t how he expected this to go.  Why wasn’t he talking to Noreen in her office?

“Okay,” Noreen said slowly, “Well, I’ll hang on to this and we’ll give you a call if we want you to come in for an interview,” she smiled cordially and stood up.

Frank stood up stiffly.  Was it over already?  He stood silently for a second, not knowing what to say, then extended his hand.  “Thank you, I look forward to hearing from you,” he said with as much feigned pep in his voice as he could muster.  He knew they would never call, but that was all he could think to say.  She was already walking back toward the glass doors before he even finished his sentence.  It all went so fast.         

Frank avoided eye contact with the pretty receptionist as he stepped to the exit.  He was so embarrassed.  He felt like a damn fool.  He hung his head and his shoulders slumped as he pushed the heavy glass door.  The stiflingly hot and muggy air hit him in the face like a hammer the second he stepped outside.  The air was thick and uncomfortable.  It stuck in his throat.  He tried to muster up his pride as he shuffled to his car.  He tried to walk with his chin held high, but it was nearly impossible.  He wanted to run.

When Frank got back to his car, he jumped in quickly and turned the key.  The interior of the car felt like the surface of the sun and he sweat profusely through his shirt.  The vents pushed out hotter air.  He drove out of the parking lot rapidly, trying to flee from his humiliation.  His shirt was itching his neck and the open windows did little to cool him down. 

He looked down at the gas gauge and his shoulders slumped further.  He knew he had no money in his pocket.  He had no money anywhere.  His shirt clung to his back, his shoes felt awkward.  A mile down the road he pulled into a gas station and turned off the engine.  He sat in the seat for a moment looking straight ahead.  He blinked and gripped the steering wheel.  After a long moment he looked down at a handful of coins in a jar in the console of his car.  He picked up the jar and started fishing quarters out with one finger.  He put the quarters in his lap on his grey dress-slacks.  His eyes welled for a second as he fished for change. 

He pumped four dollars and seventy-five cents worth of gas into his car and walked into the station to pay.  He didn’t meet the eyes of any of the people he passed on the way in.  His belt felt too tight.  He wished he didn’t have these uncomfortable clothes on.  He wanted to run away from the feeling he had, but that was impossible.  The feeling clung to him like a straightjacket.  His chest felt like someone was sitting on it.  When his turn came, he handed the cashier the sweaty stack of coins without meeting his eyes and turned to flee out to his car.

Frank stepped into his boiling car and started the engine.  He held the steering wheel and stared straight forward.  He glanced down at the blue shirt and grey slacks he was wearing then over to the manila folder that had previously held his résumé.  The little orange gas pump next to his gas gauge was still on.  The vents blew out hot air.  He stared forward and tried to keep from crying.  With a sweaty hand he put the car into drive and the few remaining coins in the jar of change rattled as the car lurched forward and rolled away from the gas pump.  

THE END

Abandon All Hope

(Written 9/22/11)

Sell ALL things of value that can’t be eaten or used as a weapon. Trade for pure gold and purified water. Run for the hills. People will soon find that the highly material wealth they think they have is an indolent illusion and intangible upon review. The jig is up, John Q. One by one the coffers are being opened to reveal nothing but dust. It was all an elaborate hoax! The US Government hasn’t had gold in Fort Knox since World War II. That’s why they keep it so tightly under wraps. Abandon all hope.

The Dow dropped almost 400 points today in another frenetic fury. The jackals on Wall Street don’t know what the hell to do. Like monkeys trying to figure out an etch-a-sketch. “Uhh, err, uhh, people need to spend more,” is the general idea. Brilliant. And I need to fuck more and drink more and golf more and swim in a pool of gold bullion. Fucking brilliant. Logic on the order of telling a thirsting man in the desert to chug all his reserves of water to ensure that he’ll have piss to drink later on.

The problem is simply that we, as a country, lived beyond our means for years. Our nation experienced a meteoric rise to power in the last century and in true American form we hammed it up like wild Kennedys until day broke and the money manager came to us with hat in hand, his long face telling us what we dreaded. The carnival is closing. The lights are going out. We thought we could barrel through with good ol’ American gumption but this is now that pesky second dip that has worried many people, including me, since, well, the first dip. The intrinsic problems that got us into the “recession” (read depression) have not magically gone away, or gone away otherwise. Lack of tangible production and gluttonous over-expenditures will bind up an empire every time and a couple years of squawk about tightening up the belt and pulling ourselves up by the bootstraps isn’t going to fix the problem. The problem being that everyone wants to play and no one wants to produce anything. The depression is a correction. Everything was blown far north of overblown. It was a vanity fueled jet airliner firing mile-high but with the landing gear stripped out to allow room for the kegs. The goddamn hippies did it. It was all those lazy fucking baby boomers that let the pile of dishes build up out of the sink. The next couple of years will be a kick in the nuts. And let’s hope it stops there. Lucky for me, I don’t have shit anyway. Losing half of zero still leaves me with zero. (At least I don’t have water seeping up through the living room floor in my apartment……oh wait.)

There may be hope yet. If America can stay in front of computer technology we will retain our gluttonous position at the top of the heap. Let’s just hope that the heap can continue to hold the mass of humans in some semblance of order.

Abandon all hope.

SILENCE

The silence was suffocating.  The dark impenetrable.  He wanted to stand up, scream out, and be shot dead.  The aching senseless void was too much. 

     A frustrating mix of decision and circumstance led Gordon Williams to the place he now huddled.  If he could go back in time, he would certainly do things much differently.  But what good is fantasy in a situation like this? 

He quivered and spine-clenching chills ran down his body.  The only discernible sound was that of the rapid thumping of his heart, and he wasn’t even sure if he was hearing that or just feeling it pounding inside his skull.

     He looked down at his hands covered in blood, the Enemy’s blood.  What had he done?  He put his head in his blood-soaked hands and started to cry, gripping his hair in fists. 

Mired in his debilitating fear, and with the silence enveloping him and a vicious tangle of paradoxical emotions assaulting the walls of his mind, Gordon’s subconscious feverishly constructed a curious bulwark to defend against complete shutdown.  In the depths of his internal Hell, his mind suddenly wandered to cheerful thoughts of his younger sister and the pranks she used to play back in Oklahoma. 

It was a rare week that Janey, six years his junior, didn’t get him good.  She was a pistol, always bursting into trouble that she would invariably talk herself out of with a skill that left each involved party speechless.  The people in town would watch her with slightly shameful giggles as she expertly swindled the few remaining tourists who traveled down the old Route 66 cutting through town.  In the 1950s, Davenport, Oklahoma was one of the first towns along the Mother Road to be bypassed by a super-highway, and the town withered.

But the old road still drew a few bright-eyed tourists.  Most of whom would leave Davenport smiling and thanking Janey for one thing or another while she smiled back and bid farewell with the husband’s wallet in the back pocket of her baggy dungarees and the wife’s watch in the hand that wasn’t waving a warm goodbye.  The townsfolk would shake their heads and go back to their business with barely perceptible smiles on their faces.  There was nothing they could do even if they wanted to do something; is what they would rationalize to themselves as they would chuckle. 

The truth was, little Janey Williams was a force of nature that none of them wished to match wits with; and, besides, she was as charming and amiable as she was crafty, the little devil-possessed darling of the town, and they all revered her, despite sometimes being on the receiving end of her prankish and light-fingered ways. 

With his face pressed to the floor of the rotten, silent forest, Gordon Williams smiled slightly as he thought about his sister. 

Sometimes the tourists would come back and the sheriff would begrudgingly have to go out to find Janey in one of her many hidden habitats throughout the town.  After a half a day spent rooting around culverts and barn lofts the Sheriff would drag her down to the station where the bewildered tourists would be waiting impatiently.  And that’s when the real magic would begin.  Like a light bulb, instantly Janey would be on and running.

     “Hello Mister and Missus Haviland, how are you?” Janey would ask with such a charming smile and southern drawl that the Haviland’s conviction would immediately begin visibly melting away.  Their eyes would nervously shift down, unable to maintain eye contact with the intense gaze of this little girl striding at them with her hand outthrust for a firm handshake. 

“The Good Sheriff Mister Pottleman came and got me just now as I was saying my prayers before going back to my chores at the farm.” She would hop up to sit on the table, kicking her feet back and forth and smiling widely, as comfortable as a caterpillar in cocoon.  “Why, the Good Sheriff Mr. Pottleman said that you were in need of talking to me right away so I came just as quick as I could.” 

The Sheriff would roll his eyes at the little maestro at work as he would lean languidly on a desk behind the tourists, knowing that he found her rigging a two-stage trip-wire that would eventually dump water then flour on the head of whichever of the local schoolboys had the misfortune of previously upsetting miss Janey Williams.

     At the Sheriff’s office it wouldn’t take long for Janey to convince the couple that they must have left their things at a rest stop or local lavatory.  There would be plenty of dramatics and very little talking by anyone other than Janey and after a grand performance the couple would be so embarrassed at accusing such a nice innocent little girl of thievery, when in fact, they themselves had misplaced their possessions by sheer stupidity, that they would give her ten or twenty dollars to compensate for taking her away from her prayers/chores before shuffling back to their car in shame.

By the time they got back on the road, again with little Janey Williams waving a sunny cheerio, they would also be missing the valve caps for their tires and the Snickers bar from the wife’s purse. 

Janey would sing an angelic farewell to the Good Sheriff Mr. Pottleman, who would grumble to himself beneath his grey mustache and walk back into the station, powerless against the little terror skipping down the dusty sidewalk chewing happily on a Snickers bar. 

And that’s how it would go in Davenport, Oklahoma.

Awakening from his momentary respite of reverie, the thick silence of the forest seemed to be gagging Gordon, like he was drowning.  He knew the Enemy was out there and he couldn’t get enough oxygen.  In the terrifying quiet, each breath sounded so loud that his fear forced him to breathe shallowly and slowly.  He was drowning.  Gordon wished his little sister were with him right now.  She wouldn’t be scared, she wasn’t scared of anything, and she would be chatting his ear off, not giving a second thought to the dangers surrounding them. 

But Janey wasn’t there; she was in her first week of seventh grade back in Davenport.  Gordon was alone and the silence was a sharp scalpel stabbing his ears and cold fingers wrapping around his throat.

-----------------------

     “Where’s Williams?” The Lieutenant asked Staff Sergeant Clancy Callahan in a frail and frightened whisper, looking down the line of troops squatting in the forest.  They had gone on a daytime patrol but now they were lost in Enemy territory.  The dark had fully set in.

     Staff Sergeant Clancy Callahan turned from the Lieutenant and quietly worked his way down the line of troops asking if anyone had seen Williams.  He was pissed off.  A week ago the army had saddled him with the greenhorn lieutenant who was just as dumb as Clancy would expect of spit-polished Second John straight out of the ROTC.  

     He knew that the missing soldier, Private First Class Gordon Williams, and all the other men, had heard him yell at the Lieutenant earlier, imploring him to not go down into the valley, that it was a nest of Enemy activity.  But the Lieutenant had just kept looking feebly at his map and compass, muttering to himself about the way back to the base. 

It was then, as Staff Sergeant Callahan had thrown up his hands in frustration, knowing that the Lieutenant was miscalculating their position by a whole mountain range, that he had seen all the men looking at him.  Many of them were barely eighteen, pale-faced and petrified.

     At that moment, behind him, the Lieutenant had ordered the platoon down into the valley, puffing his chest and saying he was sure it was the right way home. 

At this order, the troops had all glanced again at Staff Sergeant Clancy Callahan, standing silhouetted by the sun, low in the sky. They knew him too well for him to be able to fully hide the worry and horror on his face when he heard the order.  He would be knowingly leading his men into Enemy territory behind an oblivious officer trying to make it home for bedtime.

And now it was the dark of night and they were lost on a narrow trail in thick Enemy territory and a soldier was missing in the forest.  Callahan crept down the line of frightened men.

“Martinez, you seen Williams?” 

Martinez shook his head.

“Harvey, you seen Williams?”

Harvey shrugged, wishing he knew.  Callahan placed his hand on his shoulder as he moved down the line, trying to impart a confidence he didn’t feel himself.

At the end of the line, Manewski was silently signaling Staff Sergeant Callahan, worry veiling his face.

“What you got?” Callahan rested on one knee beside his trooper, looking over Manewski’s shoulder at the black forest.  The Enemy is out there somewhere, that much he knew.

“I thought he was right behind me, Sarge,” Manewski muttered quietly.

“When did you last see him?”

“I…I don’t know, a half hour ago maybe.” Manewski was frazzled and wishing he could remember better.  He knew he should have been checking every minute or so. 

“I thought he was right behind me but this fucking dark, I just…I was watching for the goddamn Enemy in the fucking forest.”  He put his helmet in his hands and shook his head.

Staff Sergeant Clancy Callahan silently stared at the dark forest from which they came, motionless.  “It’s all right, soldier.” He shifted around toward the front of the line, still squatting. “Eat a ration, keep alert.” 

The soldiers looked at him like a frightened toddler looks to his father when a loose dog is bearing down.  Fear and need.  He would keep them safe, they prayed.  He must keep them safe.

--------------------

Gordon Williams finally gained the courage to move his head.  He shifted slightly.  The man he had just killed, an Enemy machine-gunner, was sprawled on the ground, his lifeless eyes seeming to stare at Gordon.

Gordon looked at the dead Enemy and shook his head in frustration.  Gordon had been taking up the rear, right behind Stan Manewski on the tiny dark trail when he thought he heard something and spun around to look.  When he’d turned back Manewski and the rest of the platoon had been gone. 

His mind had gone wild, knowing that they had been lost in Enemy territory using the Enemy’s own labyrinth of footpaths to try to escape to safety.

The panic had hit Gordon in a violent wave.  He’d spun around, looking at the thick black forest around him.  His heart had started pounding and jumped into his throat and his knees went weak.  It had taken all his mental fortitude to regain some level of composure.  Nearly hyperventilating, he’d rushed off in the direction he thought the platoon had been moving, diving through the thick forest. 

It was then that the tiny trail had suddenly opened up and he’d come face to face with the Enemy in a machine-gun nest.  The single soldier had been shocked stiff and hesitated for just long enough for Gordon to grab his knife in an instinctual flurry and flush his arm out and slice through the throat of the Enemy before he even knew what he was doing.  The Enemy had slumped silently to the ground. 

The explosion of adrenaline and fear inside Gordon had left his knees wobbly and his head spinning and he’d staggered and toppled onto the dying Enemy.  This was the first man Gordon Williams had ever killed.  It was the first time he had even seen the Enemy.  Pressed face to face on the floor of a machine-gun nest, the Enemy had looked pleadingly into Gordon’s eyes in his last moments of his life with blood running through his fingers over the fatal wound.

Now, nearly a half an hour later, Gordon looked into the dead Enemy’s eyes and willed himself to move for the first time since the shocking encounter and slaying.  Trembling, he pulled his torso up and peered over the sandbags lining the nest.  But the moonless night shrouded the forest and he couldn’t see a thing.  He knew the Enemy was out there but he had no idea where, and he had no idea where the rest of the platoon was or which way was base.  Someone would be coming to relief the machine-gunner; he didn’t know when, but it was just a matter of time.  He slumped back to the ground and the dead Enemy stared at him.

Then he prayed.  At first he prayed just to occupy his mind, to get it off the horrors surrounding him, but then he prayed with clenching intensity.  He clutched his rifle with white-knuckled hands and pressed his forehead forcibly against the barrel, as if it were a steel crucifix.  Drawing his knees up to his chest on the forest floor, with his eyes shut tight and tears streaming down his face, Gordon prayed vigorously, madly, desperately.  He prayed for his comrades to find him.  He prayed for the Enemy to be not near.  He prayed for forgiveness for his trespass.  He prayed to be home, away from this God-forgotten Hell, listening to his sister’s stories.  He prayed to be struck dead.  Most of all though, he prayed for an end to this awful silence.

-------------------------

“Out of the question, Sergeant, it’s too risky, could get us all killed.”

“With all due respect, Sir, I’m not leaving a soldier out here.”

“That was an order, Sergeant.  Do not forget your rank.”

Staff Sergeant Clancy Callahan’s eyes narrowed and he clenched his teeth, trying to hide the anger and disdain he was feeling.  The Lieutenant was speaking straight from the textbook of some suckling ROTC course while one of Callahan’s men was lost in thick Enemy territory.  Clancy Callahan, a fifteen-year veteran with the medals and scars to prove it, rigidly glared into the eyes of the greenhorn lieutenant who shifted his gaze and raised his nose and stared out into the blackened forest.

“Yes sir.” 

Callahan stood-up, fully erect, and looked down at the quivering man below him; a pitiful specimen of a man who glanced nervously from the corner of his eye, not moving his head.

Callahan turned, still standing tall, his bear-sized chest expanding with a great inhalation of air.  It was as if he were drinking in the fierce plasmatic energy of the forest; as if the gods of war were diving into his lungs, making him grow in stature.  The line of men looked up at their Sergeant.  He was invincible.

He strode down the line and signaled for Manewski to stand up.  Stan Manewski nervously got to his feet, still bent at the waist, not wanting to rise above the cover.

“I can’t make you go, and I can’t guarantee you’ll make it back,” was all that Staff Sergeant Callahan said, never taking his eyes off the forest.

Manewski looked down at his feet for a moment then up at the Sergeant.  He was nervous, he didn’t want to go.  He wanted to be back at base.  He didn’t want to die.  But neither did he want to live with himself if he didn’t go. 

He looked up at his Sergeant and nodded his head, his eyes belying any courage he was attempting to present.

At the other end of the line, the greenhorn Lieutenant turned to look just in time to see Staff Sergeant Callahan talking to Manewski.  To his shock, they suddenly walked off toward the forest, Callahan still walking tall and Manewski moving in a crouch.  And then they were gone.

The Lieutenant jumped nearly to his feet before remembering to keep his head below cover.  He started to shout out for them to halt, this instant, but he was petrified that the Enemy would kill him if he made any noise.  So he quietly sat down and angrily looked at the black voided forest into which the two soldiers had been swallowed.

--------------------

The silence was driving Gordon insane.  He couldn’t take it any longer.  It was like an enormous serpent coiled around his chest, constricting, constricting, constricting.  He was panicking; he rose to his knees, again feeling like he was drowning.  His mind was falling out of his grasp, he was hearing voices, he was hearing his sister’s voice.

On his knees he whimpered and with his head pressed into his gun he swayed as if he were on a boat, grasping the upright barrel for support.  He needed to take a deep breath so badly, he needed to scream.  But he was paralyzed.  The evil, heartless silence pecked mercilessly at his brain with falcon’s beaks and clawed relentlessly at his mind, ripping gashes in its fabric.  This is unbearable!  He grabbed his hair in his bloody hands.  His body shook.

Then, like a hammer striking a stained-glass window, the silence was shattered by the sharp snap of a stick breaking in the forest beside him.  The noise was loud and clear, and was followed by a rustling in the brush. 

Gordon Williams looked up to see the outline of a soldier of War looming over him out of the black forest.  Gordon jumped to his feet and swung up his rifle and the last thing that Staff Sergeant Clancy Callahan saw on this earth was the muzzle flash of a three shot burst from Gordon Williams’ automatic rifle at point blank range.

The outburst of gunfire reverberated in Gordon’s ears, distorting the world around him and drawing away his balance. He looked down in surreal terror at his Sergeant lying in a heap on the forest floor.  Gordon could see Manewski through the dark, staring in shock.

Gordon dropped the gun and it tumbled to his feet.  The world froze for a moment, a chilling, silent moment.  Then gunfire erupted from all around them, the sounds of a thousand thunderstorms boomed.  Gordon Williams and Stan Manewski were riddled with Enemy bullets and knocked back off their feet onto the forest floor.

Lying on the ground dying, with blood coughing out of gasping breaths, Gordon Williams heard his sister chatting happily, and then he heard a sustained volley of gunfire and screams coming from the black void.  The battle lasted for half a minute, followed by a few final shots a moment later.  Gordon felt the warmth of his own blood running down his side and heard the Enemy yelling all around him.  He heard his sister’s voice.

And then it all went silent.

THE END

Route 66 - The Slow Painful Death of Our Mother

Broken down, ruinous, a haunting echo of former resplendency.  What was once an Old West amusement park in the middle of Oklahoma is now a dilapidated and greasy adult video store.  The billboard across the street - an Ad Council attempt to curb rampant and insidious crystal-meth abuse - flutters, torn and peeling as a lonely tumbleweed skitters across the crumbling parking lot.  Welcome to the Route 66 of 2011.

Route 66 wasn’t always like this.  At one time it joyfully carried millions of hopes and dreams to distant and exciting lands, all the while nurturing the many various dreams of road-side proprietors from Chicago to Los Angeles.  An icon if there ever was one, Route 66 was established on November 11, 1926 and removed from the US Highway System on June 27, 1985, deemed “no longer relevant”.  Put in those words it is quite sad; though experiencing its current state, it’s tough to argue.  “America’s Highway”, that lays claim to the first drive-thru restaurant – Red’s Giant Hamburg in Springfield, Illinois – the firstly coined “Mom and Pop” shops and also the first Los Angeles freeway, is a meandering jaunt through the annals of American history and culture.  But, unfortunately, it is just that: history; an expansive ruin to be viewed like the Mayan cities of the Yucatan and the Coliseum of Rome.

“The world used to come to us,” said one waitress in a dusty old diner as she looked sadly around her fading town along Route 66. “Now no one comes”.  I’d heard similar quotes before, as I imagine had she, but what else can be said.  These towns are dead, but the residents are like lion cubs sniffing around their dead mother, no inkling of where to go or what to do, just hoping that their mother will suddenly wake up and carry on providing for them. 

The beginning of the end came in 1956 when President Dwight D. Eisenhower signed the Interstate Highway Act.  He was the torch bearer of this new legislation, stemming from his grueling drive across country in a 1919 military convoy.  Eisenhower rightly believed that in the name of national defense, America needed an Autobon-esque highway system.  Again, tough to argue; the relentless press of progress must be accepted.  But at what cost?  Like the internet, or diet pills, this progress came with sad realities.  The Turner Turnpike from Tulsa to Oklahoma City, an 88 mile toll road, was the first to show the grim augury of what Route 66 would become.  This turnpike made the travel between the metropolises much quicker and easier, but did this by blithely bypassing ALL of the small towns that had once prospered along the banks of Route 66.  This disregard quickly showed in the nooks and crannies of these once thriving villages.  Now, they crumble to dust, desperately clinging to the few tourists that have the time and adequate vehicle suspension to travel Old Route 66 for nostalgic pleasure.  Towns along Route 66 took this the way a dog takes being kicked: they either laid down and showed their bellies, or bared their teeth and fought.  Some places tried to assuage the pain of bypasses with legislation.  New Mexico even carried a short-lived law that strictly forbade them.  But, like an abusive master, progress marched on, adamant and unyielding. 

Now, 55 years after the Interstates began, they have all but wiped out Route 66.  If it weren’t for the National Route 66 Preservation Bill, signed by Bill Clinton in 1999 that allotted 30 million dollars to restore and preserve this famous route, it would be nearly impossible to navigate.  Now, at least, the route is dotted with signs reading “Historic 66 Route”.  But these signs are still very tough to follow.  They lead into the long forgotten towns just fine, but once through the lonely main street, one is left to his or her own reckoning to exit the town.  The remaining residents of these locales try to make a living on the old highway, selling worthless baubles all made in China to the few passing tourists eager to stop at anything that looks like a roadside attraction.  But the baubles in Oklahoma are the exact same baubles found in New Mexico and so on.  We live in a capitalistic society, for good or ill, and it seems that no one is willing to make any real investment in the dilapidated properties along the withered Mother Road.  People have interest, no doubt.  “Oo, that sounds like such an adventure,” one woman marveled, captivated as my wife and I told her of our journey down Route 66.  But, if asked to put stock in the highway, I doubt any sane investor would jump at the opportunity.  And it shows; one of the biggest attractions along the 2400-mile route is a fifty-foot-tall futuristic Coke bottle plopped completely out of place at a gas station in the middle of farm land.  It’s draw or meaning, who knows?  Yet it remains one of the few modern investments evident amongst the ruins.

Much of the way, Route 66 runs parallel to either Interstate 44 or 40, just fifty yards or so from the highway that took its place.  It makes those portions of the drive rather tedious and very pointless, just a slower pot-holed road a stones-throw from the dreaded interstates.  Nostalgia, forget it.  The drone of trucks bumbling past wipes any feel of the old road.  And every one of the exits along the interstates could very well be mistaken for any interstate exit in America.  McDonalds, Wendy’s, Motel 6; signs and logos so branded into our brains that they become a ringing nuisance like the Macarena.  The only respite from this chain-store-nausea comes when the old Route 66 branches off into the desert or wilderness to access small tribal towns and long-forgotten hamlets.  It is during these portions that one can finally get a feel of what the old road might have once been like.  A two-lane burn though arid landscapes to feel free.  On these stretches one can imagine what farmers from the mid-west would have seen and felt as they optimistically fled the dust-bowl of the 1930s for the fertile farm land of central California, or what desperate workers would have experienced as they ran to the Pacific coast for “war jobs” during World War II.  A dangerous hair-pinned wind up and over the Black Mountains would have been the last deadly obstacle to California for travelers of Route 66 before 1953.  And one of the most thriving attractions of the whole route is just after this nerve-wracking journey. 

Thriving may be a gross overstatement because the town of Oatman, Arizona is, by its own distinction, a ghost town.  This small, old-west mining town is a journey back in time.  A massive band of wild burros walk around the main street, looking for a hand-full of cornmeal or carrots from the tourists that are surprisingly prominent.  The town seemed to remain unchanged for centuries and was quite a sight.  But inside the stores the same realities exist: worthless trinkets haunt the few shelf-spaces that don’t lay vacant.  “Not a lot to do here in Oatman,” one proprietor joked when we told him we were from New York, offering us the understatement of the year.  He chatted with us for a half-an-hour or so, seeming fairly starved for conversation.  He talked about the coyotes that would sometimes make a run through town, and the abnormally large cat that was a resident as much as the people or burros.  “That cat would take down a coyote if it ever messed with her,” he laughed.  He talked about the exciting arrival of the new baby burro and tried to remember what its name was and exactly who the father was.  He thought that its mother must have strayed out into the mountains and gotten pregnant by an outsider.  “She likes to roam, ya know, and that baby is too dark to be from any of the males in town,” he imparted with great thought.  Ah, the day to day life in Oatman, Arizona.

There do still remain some elements of charm and nostalgia along the withering Mother Road, one of which is that it follows the railroad almost all of the way.  The Santa Fe Line carries freight and passenger trains back and forth and is perhaps a very fitting partner to Route 66; both nearly extinct and quickly being overtaken by that pesky march of progress, consoling each other with lonely train whistles and shifting truck gears.   

Despite its dilapidation, Route 66 is certainly still held in the hearts and minds of Americans and the world as a whole.  Cities like Tulsa, Oklahoma City and Flagstaff still celebrate the Mother Road, and every little town along the route is splattered with “Route 66 this” and “Route 66 that”.  But the sad truth is that most people drive the interstates thinking that they are driving the old Route 66 while bypassing everything that once made 66 what it was.  And the end result is that the actual route itself is indeed “no longer relevant”; no longer useful as a road for travel and commerce and, apart from a few exceptions, no longer all that interesting. 

That said, while parked at a long boarded-up car-hop in Texas, where weeds perpetually beset the parking lot from cracks that grow wider with every day, the American spirit wafts outward through the broken windows and with the right set of eyes one can see a line of convertibles and cheery teenage girls in bobby-sox skirts carrying fresh hamburgers to bushy-tailed American families, bright and eager to see what lies further down the Mother Road, wide smiles and wonder, brimming with adamant expectations for the American dream, never knowing that they are unwittingly writing American history onto the parchment of a sprawling macadam scroll that will one day turn to dust but shall never be forgotten.