four times four

Annabelle India Cynthia Knox did not like Michael Hurley, and she let it be known throughout the fifth grade. She did not like his shockingly red hair, too bold for an eleven-year-old. She did not like his thousands of freckles, so distracting when one is trying to figure out multiplication or concentrate on diorama building. She did not like his habit of running everywhere – to the bus, to lunch, to recess, to class, to the bathroom, to the chalkboard even, for goodness sake! – which lead to his habit of crashing into things, like the wall or a tree or his desk. Or Annabelle. Twice. Michael Hurley, Annabelle decreed, was a giant loser, and not worth anyone’s time.

Michael Hurley’s only response to this, when Jason P. came back from recess and told him what Isaac told him Steffi told him Annabelle said, was to spin his right index finger in a tight circle at the side of his head, in the universal sign for “looney tunes.” Then he turned back to the picture of ninjas he was drawing, and continued his work, whistling.

When Annabelle heard this, through Jason P. to Gretchen to CJ to Steffi to her, she was furious. She kicked the monkey bars and crossed her arms and blew out a frustrated, emphatic “hmph!” and turned to her four best friends – Steffi and Liza and Reeca and Jules – and declared war.

The first thing they did was switch seats. A small opening shot, but an effective one nonetheless. Michael had problems with multiplication, and everyone knew he cheated off Reeca during tests. So Annabelle raised her hand in the middle of class and asked if she could be moved, “because I’m having problems concentrating with the smell and all,” and after an affronted “Hey!” from Michael and a lot of sighing from Mr. Palmacci and snickering from the class, Mr. Palmacci let Annabelle switch with Liza, who switched with Jules, who switched with Reeca, into Annabelle’s original seat behind Michael.

When Michael saw the girls getting up and gathering their books in a well orchestrated maneuver, he knew what had really happened, and he looked over to Jason P. and narrowed his eyes. The war was on.

Retaliation came the next day at lunch, when all five girls opened their bags and reached in for sandwiches and pulled out plastic baggies of worms instead. Annabelle’s were the fattest and most squirmy. The girls screamed even louder than expected, and none of the guys, Michael or Jason P. or Carlos or Billy, could stop laughing, it was so funny. They were still laughing when the girls turned to them with evil glares. No one said anything, but everyone knew more was coming.

There was the hall pass maneuver. The swing set attack. The prank call offensive. The frog guts incident (involving a daring raid on the sixth grade science lab in order to get the necessary parts). The Field Day retaliation. The Valentine’s card betrayal. Until, finally, there was four squares.

+++

Every Wednesday recess, Annabelle and her friends played four squares. It was only Wednesdays, because four square was the most popular game amongst the girls at school, and there was only one court, so a schedule had to be made as to who got playing time when. Mr. Palmacci’s fifth grade class got Wednesdays, Recess B, and Annabelle always declared herself fourth square to start. Annabelle rarely lost.

Four square was a girl’s game; the boys never wanted to play. They always ran for the kickball field or the basketball court or to the corner of the yard to dig in the dirt and plan mischief. This was fine with the girls, who were orderly and patient as they waited their turn in line, planning what games they’d make up if they landed in the fourth square. They did not need the chaos of the boys to ruin their game.

It was a beautiful spring day and Annabelle India Cynthia Knox surveyed the playground from her fourth square domain. They were six games in, and no one had managed to get her out. She didn’t plan to let them. Liza had already rotated in and out twice, she couldn’t catch a ball if her life depended on it, and Reeca had just been knocked out on an alphabet game. Annabelle thought about what to try next and watched as Reeca left the square to join the back of the line. Annabelle’s eyes followed her absently, thinking of double-bounces and animals that might begin with the letter X. Reeca passed the Schaffer twins at the front of the line, Sarah Caulk behind them, and then, to Annabelle’s shock and horror, she saw it. Standing behind Sarah, his hands stuffed in his pockets, his horrible red hair shining in the sun, was Michael Hurley. And right behind him was Jason P. And Carlos. And Billy.

The other girls noticed the interlopers just as Annabelle did, and they looked to her for a cue. But what could she do? Recess wasn’t even half over, and it was four square. The game must go on.

Lindsey Schaffer missed the ball on the first toss. Anna came in. Jules forgot to triple-bounce. Sarah came in. Liza couldn’t think of a fruit that began with F. And Michael Hurley stepped onto the first square.

Annabelle didn’t pause for even a second; she couldn’t afford to show weakness, and she’d been plotting the game she’d use to end this encroachment immediately. Double-bounce, name a character in The Baby-Sitter’s Club, bounce-pass. Boys didn’t read those books, Annabelle knew. She doubted they could even read at all.

Annabelle double-bounced, said “Kristy,” and bounce-passed to Michael, who eyed her funny. He double-bounced too, and said “Stacey,” and bounce-passed to Sarah. Annabelle couldn't believe it. How could an annoying, loud-mouthed boy like Michael Hurley know that? Sarah got Claudia and Anna said Mary Anne but forgot to bounce-pass, just tossed it to Annabelle, so she was out. Jason P. stepped in and Michael Hurley moved to square two.

Annabelle always had contingency plans, and she would not be bested. “Next game is bounce, name a Miley Cyrus song, bounce, then toss pass.” She knew Jason P. would get it, he had a younger sister after all, and he did, but Jason P. didn't matter. She could knock him out once Michael Hurley was done. Annabelle had her priorities; her eyes were on the prize.

But Michael Hurley got it too, and Sarah didn’t miss of course, and they had to go another round. Annabelle was so shocked she almost blanked on a song, almost forgot to bounce before the pass. And then Jason P. again, and Michael again, and this time Sarah said “Start All Over,” which was right, but was also the song Jason P. named, so she was out too. And Carlos came in and now Michael Hurley moved to square three, right next to Annabelle, and that red hair was so distracting, but not as distracting as the challenge in his eyes.

Annabelle expected the boys to be aggressive or mean or chaotic. She expected them to hurl the ball, make up rules, try to hit someone in the face. But they didn’t do any of that. They played like the girls played, orderly, and they didn’t talk to each other or crack jokes. In fact, the only time they spoke at all was to give their answer for the game. “Stacey.” “7 Things.” “Yak.” “Water buffalo.” “Viper.” Annabelle thought as quickly as she could to try to trip them up, but they go round after round, without forgetting a word or a bounce.

After five rounds of animal names, reverse alphabetically, she called for a new game. It was a rule the girls made up to keep the game challenging, and for a second it seemed like the boys might rebel. But Michael looked at each boy in turn, and no one said anything. Annabelle thought for a moment, the ball balanced on her hip, and it came to her. The perfect solution to getting Michael Hurley out.

“Triple-bounce,” she said, “double-bounce pass,” she continued. “And the multiplication tables for nine, in order.”

There was an audible intake of breath from the line, which had grown as fifth-graders around the playground gathered to watch boys take over the four-square court. Annabelle put on her sweetest fake smile and looked at Michael Hurley. There was sweat on his over-freckled face, and he chewed his lip in that nervous tic Annabelle despised, but his eyes were narrowed in determination and he didn’t look away. Michael Hurley took the challenge.

“Nine,” she said after her triple bounce, and double-bounce passed to Carlos. “Eighteen,” he said with all the right bounces, and gave her a look that mades her feel about as big as a toothpick. “Twenty-seven,” said Jason P., but slowly, and he bounced slowly too. Annabelle figured he was trying to give Michael time to remember the answer.

“Thirty-six,” Michael said, and looked Annabelle directly in the eye as he passed.

“Forty-five,” Annabelle said, surprised he got that. But there’s no way that he could know the next one, he’d cheated off Reeca from almost the start of the year. She took a breath and monitored the boys, checking their math and their bounces.

“Fifty-four.”

“Sixty-three.”

“Seventy-two.”

A pause before he said it, but then a gasp from the crowd when he did. And now it was a crowd, all of fifth grade, both classes, gathered in a half circle around the players. Even if Annabelle got one of the boys out, Billy still waited on deck, she’d still need at least three games to clear the square of all the intruders, send them back to their dirt and their ball fields. “Eighty-one,” Annabelle said. This round would be her triumph, good-bye to Michael Hurley, once and for all.

“Ninety,” said Carlos, easy as anything.

“Ninety-nine,” said Jason P. Bounce, bounce, pass.

“One-oh-eight,” said Michael, without a pause, and with triumph in his eyes.

And then there’s the ball, bouncing up to Annabelle, and then there’s Annabelle, holding it for a beat, her mind blank. They’d only gone up to twelve on their multiplication chart, she didn’t think they’d get this far in the game. Another beat. She should’ve been adding the nines in her head, she should’ve been ready just in case. A third, and that’s all you get in four square. She waited too long, she didn’t even think to triple-bounce to buy time, she just stood in the fourth square, holding the ball, unable to move, defeated.

From the sidelines the girls were stone-cold quiet, and then a cheer went up, started by Billy, that all the boys in the yard picked up. Shouts of “you’re out!” came from some boy in the back, but Annabelle still couldn’t move from the shock. They'd moved their desks so he couldn’t cheat, so Michael Hurley had started studying. How could she have known? Ninety, ninety-nine, one-oh-eight, the end.

And now Michael Hurley is coming toward her, stepping over the line between square three and square four to claim his new rank. Annabelle is still standing, rooted to the pavement, holding the ball in front of her where it bounced. He is going to grab it, she supposes, maybe elbow her out of the way to get her to move. She doesn’t think she can move, so he might have to. He is walking toward her, that bright red hair like flames in the sun, his grass green eyes locked on hers triumphantly. Around them there is cheering from the boys still, and now arguing from the girls, and general mayhem, but the sound fades out as Annabelle watches the end of the war approach.

Michael Hurley is in front of her, and he puts his hands on the rubber ball like she thought he would, but he doesn’t elbow her aside. He holds the ball on the opposite side from where her hands are and he leans in and she thinks he might whisper something to her, something mean and victorious. But instead, in front of the whole fifth-grade class and under the spring sun, Michael Hurley puts his pursed lips on Annabelle India Cynthia Knox’s own and kisses her chastely in the middle of square four.

It is only a second, but she drops her hands from the ball in shock. Michael Hurley steps back and smiles.

“One seventeen,” he says with a bounce. “I win.”

oh dear!

beaten by the sun

These kids, there are so many, and all of them look so different from each other. We have cameras fixed on them, and the bulbs of our mics capture what they say, though they talk without sound. Right now I'm interviewing this rod who has what resembles a chandelier of carrots sprouting from her scalp. Her eyes are squinted, so I can only guess that there's an intensity to her answers. A second later, she's sprinting back to the mound.

A neighbor, one who feeds rabbits to swell them for skinning, tipped us off to the kids and mound, but swore us to a secrecy we won't uphold. He told us that the kids came to the land on the coattails of dusk and started stabbing at the dull yellow drought weeds. He slept inadvertently through the night, in a chair on his porch, with a virulent, unloaded shotgun balancing in his lap.

He woke up, beaten by the sun, to see the kids impregnate the mound with a single frisbeeish landmine. They kept digging at the earth, the kids did, growing the mound with each shovelful. The man contacted us a little before noon. We came right out. He was the first one I went to see, but he refused offer up anything more than, "I already said all I know." Then he pointed to the other side of his property line to where the kids were, made tiny by the distance of two acres.

We trespassed only because we couldn't think of what else to do.

I'm serious about these kids. Not one of them looks like the other. They're moving though, really moving. They're bounding up and down the mound. Some spin like a maple's helicopter seeds, others are doing different types of jumping - rope, jacks, jumps that hadn't been invented yet when our news team was their age. So the opposite of alike, they are; damn so. One similarity though: all of their mouths are wide, un-volumed O's.

I knew immediately that we were the right choice to break this story. Finally we were getting what we deserved, even if we didn't understand what it was.

Something else I can say is that these kids are polite. They've really taken to the whole idea of being seen and not heard. From a ratings perspective, this troubles me a bit, but from a personal perspective, I'm immensely happy. I tap one on the shoulder, interview him for a bit, and when he starts to get antsy, he runs off, tags a friend and sends her to me; the friend moves her mouth in front of my mic, grins into the cameraman's shoulder-cam, and then darts away. I tap another on the shoulder, etc. Each time it's a verbal flat line.

Still, there is no shortage of volunteers. They are all so damn happy. Since they all look so different, they're easy to tell apart, even as the day teeters to its edges. I can follow each past interviewee as he or she moves around on the mount. Their gestures, though each unique, are all equally ecstatic.

A couple is grinding their heels into the mound as they twist in and out of each other, square dancing. An angelic blond takes up pantomime. A boy in a red cape does the Robot. An egg-shaped one genuflects, rolls down the mound, races back up it, genuflect, rolls down again, lands spread out at the bottom.

The cameras roll continuously.

My questioning lasts several more hours. I'm keeping each of my subjects straight, never posing the same question twice. The inquiries get more outlandish because, as I learned in broadcast school, the further you get from the crux of a story, the more likely you are to find it. I'm shouting into the vastness of this piece and, I think, I'll eventually hear an echo back.

We keep documenting, call in more tape.

Finally, some girl's kitten heel finds the land mine. It detonates and undoes the mound in a split of a split second. The kids are joyous, happier than ever. They ascend into the heavens, these kids do, mouths ringed beyond reason, and then just as quickly, they return in stumps to the flat of the earth.

When our piece aired, the station manager made us edit in their screams and the loud aftermath of gurgles as the valves of their throat opened up and fill with blood.

For dramatic effect, he said.

Ode to My Favorite Bar

So,
take a look at me now.
[ahem]
So,
take a look at me nooooooooow! There's just an empty space!

I've got a thousand stories inside me, and 954 more to go.

So,
here's to alcohol
and here's to long nights and hard times and everything that makes you feel tired
and here's to all the bands I'm quoting right now that no one knows
and here's to 20-year-old martyrs
and 25-year-old retirees,
30-year-old virgins
and 40-year-old wussy boys.
So,
hold me closer tiny dancer.

There, Jeff Knight. There's my bar poem.
Now you reread me yours.

And thank you.
And you're welcome.
And I love you, too.

Let it snow!

Before the city turns into a world of treacherous black slush, stinky yellow snow and subway delays there is one moment. One fantastical moment where all of Brooklyn is a beautiful snow globe world. Running around in the streets is encouraged. Trash can lids are uncomfortable sled rides. And you finally meet your neighbor after a mean snow ball fight.

Merry Christmas!

Release on Two

Listen/download:
Release on Two.mp3 (2:10)
(a story in sound)

again.

The parking lot is empty. They sit side by side on the curb. It is late. Overhead, the fluorescent light buzzes and hums, casting a pool of brightness around them. She follows his gaze and sees hundreds if not thousands of insects swarming around the light in a miasmic bug cloud.

“They’re so stupid,” she observes. “Why do they go into the light like that? Over and over. They never learn.”

“They can’t help it,” he says. “They’re just drawn to it.”

He steals a glance at her, while her face is turned bugward. She’s not as thin as she used to be. Fine lines surround her eyes and mouth where before there were none. But she still looks good, he thinks. After all these years.

He cracks his knuckles, shifts his weight on the hard concrete. Their knees are almost touching. “You didn’t call me out here to talk about bugs.”

Slowly she puts her hands out, spreads her fingers wide. No rings. “It’s over.”

“Over,” he repeats. “Again.”

“Over.” Emphatic.

Fifteen years at least he’s waited to hear her say that. He reaches for her naked hand, takes it in his own.

She leans in to him, her cheek pressed against his shoulder. Her smell is alien to him, and for an instant, he is outside his body, looking down at them from the bugs’ point of view, these two people, near strangers now, but who pulsate under the weight of their intertwined pasts. To the rhythm of the buzzing fluorescents.

A far-off dog bark stirs the moment. She sits up, studying his hand on hers. A sigh in the night air.

He retracts his hand, twists the gold band, tight around his sweaty finger. He pulls at it, fiercely works it up over his knuckle, and it’s off. He stares through its empty center, the hole, then tries to crush it in his fist. Futile.

She stands. She watches him until he looks up at her, squinting a little, she’s backlit with a halo of bugs.

“Come on,” she says. Leaning down, she kisses the crown of his head. “Let’s go.”

He bites the insides of his cheek and feels his chest cave in. He slips the ring back on, but it feels different, weightier.

“What?” Her question hangs between them, electric like the chirring light. They hold each other’s eyes for a spell. She looks away first.

“God.” Thoughts flitter around his brain. She’s right here, so close. “What the hell are we doing?”

“I thought this was what you wanted,” she snaps.

“I’m just… I’m just confused.”

She paces, a tigress locked up. “This should be simple.”

“I loved you,” he whispers. “I loved you and you never gave a shit.”

“You know that’s not true.”

“You never reciprocated.”

“That was then.” Her cheeks flush. “This is now.” She peers up into the night sky, concentrates on the bugs fluttering around the streetlight.

“Fuck!” He spits a little at the eff sound. “What the fuck is this?” He considers hoisting his foot up to meet her kneecap, a few inches in front of his head. Reconsiders. Maybe gripping her shoulders, shaking her.

His heart pounds furiously. He sweats. And, god, he just wants to take her, kiss her, hit her, make her stop, make her his. He can’t think. He just…

The buzzing from the lamppost grows louder, then the light overhead blinks, sparks, goes black, silent. Gradually his eyes adjust to the dimness. He breathes, calms. Nothing makes any sense. Maybe it doesn’t need to.

In the darkness, she resembles more the girl she used to be. She’s eying him tenderly, nervously, an unfamiliar vulnerability. Suddenly she swats at a lone moth that flies near her face.

“Sad,” she says. “The only thing he ever wanted and now he can’t have it.” Flashes the white teeth of a smile.

“But there’s another light over there, and right over there.” He points, needlessly. “He’ll find another one.”

The sky between them shifts. He extends his arm, hoping she’ll help pull him to his feet. But he’s groping in the dark. She’s too far gone, drawn away.

“Uh, look. I’m going to get out of here.”

He can see the outline of her body, but can’t make out the details. He can’t see her face. It must be four a.m. The outline fades, farther and farther, vanishes. He is enveloped in the night, spotlights illuminate circles of macadam in the distance, but where he is there are no bugs, no lights, nothing.

“Go!” he shouts into the blackness. A car door slam reverberates in the silence. He’s alone and she is gone. “Again.”

holy smokes!

when she got angry, she got angry!

I HUNGER FOR GOLDEN PUFFS!

You know that comic book The Fantastic Four? The Thing. Human Torch. Invisible Woman. All that. Remember Galactus? Giant purple space god who eats planets?
…
People in New York have been text messaging photos of a giant purple space god eating our planet. Starting with New York. Apparently he likes the taste of theme bars.

sigh

er, this morning I’m eating a bowl of Golden Puffs (they’re like Golden Crisp, which used to be called Sugar Smacks, but they cost seventy-five cents at Big Lots) and checking Facebook. My friend Kevin’s status reads “Kevin is watching a giant purple space god eating the planet.” And then there’s an accompanying picture of a giant purple space god eating the planet. I open a tab and check Yahoo and, sure enough, there’s lots of to-do about the end of the world. I plug my phone into the charger and there’s a bunch of text messages about the end of the world and mom leaving all sorts of voice mail, telling me I never call her and the world is coming to an end without her having any grandkids and blah blah blah. I open my blinds and the weather is weird. Lots of colorful wind, like currents of energy moving west toward New York. Trees are being uprooted and the ground is fissuring open. It looks like Earth is hurling spears of energy toward New York, but I guess they’re more like broccoli spears than pointy spears. (Hello, end of the world? These are some puns! You are welcome!) You can hear it. Loud, high-pitched screaming, as if air itself could emote. Apparently, these are symptoms of the end of the world. It feels like one of those odd things you learn, but never need to apply again, like, uh, something. Maybe Galactus is also draining me of my cleverness.

Turning on CNN, I see some crazy footage of this giant purple space god with his giant purple space kilt and giant purple two-pronged space helmet and giant planet-eating space machines. Damn. Look at that. There’s something you don’t see every day, or ever again. Thank God the Pentagon has sent the Air Force! I guess the White House needs to put up a good front. I guess. It’s not like they need to impress anyone for the next election. Because there is no next election. Nor is there a tomorrow. Nor is there a Fantastic Four. Apparently, we’re one of those example planets that has to be devoured before the audience meets the planet that stands a fighting chance. I can’t imagine what must be going through the mind of one of the Air Force pilots, to stare into the eye of a hungry god and then launch a missile into it. That is some hardcore military basic training right there. Rather than spend the last day on Earth with his family, that pilot is throwing ice cubes at the Sun.
And then that fleet of aircraft just vaporized.
I guess I just found out what goes through the minds an Air Force pilot starring into the eyes of a hungry god.
Anything that hungry god wants!
HEY-OH!

Ahhh…
I check the blogrolls on Fark. CrooksandLiars believes that the U.S. Air Force strike over New York City is an irresponsible and impeachable offense. National Review blames the coming of Galactus on the homosexual agenda.

I open that expensive bottle of bourbon I’ve been saving since graduation for something awesome. Well, here’s to not ever getting married or having kids! Ideally, I’d like to go out masturbating to Briana Banks, but, well, I doubt I could get an erection at a time like this.

I check MySpace and some teenager in Missouri has posted a bulletin denouncing Galactus as a faggot. U.S.A. #1! Take that, National Review!

The Galactus Wikipedia page is blowing up. Nerds have their comeuppance! Unfortunately, it’s on the last day of life as we know it, so it’s a bittersweet victory.

I bet there’s a whole lot of people on Earth right now thinking they spent their lives worshipping the wrong giant space god.

CNN has a tickertape notice about store lootings and general nonsensical mayhem. Apparently, poor people want to watch the apocalypse on a really nice, big, high def plasma televisions.

The world map on CNN goes insane, with landmasses curling upward toward New York, like he is bending the world toward his mouth. The world is flat again.

I put the bottle to my lips.
And then the TV cable pops out with my innerwebs connection.
And then the power goes down.
And then

by thousands

Sadie holds her breath under the water and slowly counts to ten by thousands. One one thousand, two one thousand, three one thousand. When she breaks the surface, things will be different. The world will have changed between the time that she dipped her head under the horizon and when she emerges. Four one thousand, five one thousand. The world changes by seconds, she knows, whether she’s under water or not. Seconds and less than seconds, infinitely and forever. Six one thousand, seven one thousand. But in this case, Sadie wants specific change. Eight one thousand, nine one thousand. When Sadie lifts her head out of the chlorinated pool and looks around her, she wants to see that her life is markedly and noticeably different, that she is ten pounds lighter or that there is no boring office job to return to or that Greg is not still sitting poolside flirting with the Swede from room 202. When she lifts her head out of the water, Sadie wants it all to be new.

++

Back on the east coast it is snowing. A blizzard, in fact. Sadie called her mom when they checked into the hotel, and her mom told her that Buffalo got twenty inches. Sadie thought that was a weird statistic to share, since no one they knew lived in Buffalo, but she let it go. Sadie has been letting everything go lately. She likes to think she’s attempting a Buddhist form of non-attachment, but she suspects it’s just a more mundane giving up. Even the trip here to the Keys was a giving up. Greg asked if she wanted to skip out on the holidays and go sit in the sun, swim in the ocean, drink cocktails by the pool. Sadie didn’t. She wanted to go visit her best friend in Portland, hang out in coffee shops, listen to bands, get drunk in bars. Sadie hates the relentless sunshine; she prefers the calmness of overcast, rainy days. But Greg’s question was more of a statement, like he knew she’d be excited, like he’d already gotten the tickets, like he only wanted confirmation. So she’d said sure, okay. He’d pulled the tickets out of his back pocket with a grin and handed them to her. Surprise.

++

Sadie has been dating Greg for exactly one year and six days, and she thinks that if she wasn’t so busy giving up, one year and six days would be just about long enough. She doesn’t understand why Greg doesn’t realize he feels the same way. It’s obvious he feels the same way, when he spends much of their first two vacation days chatting up lovely Swedish ladies by the pool.

++

In a move that surprised even herself, Sadie packed a sketchpad for the trip. She wasn’t sure why; she hasn’t sketched in over a year. Or painted. Or even doodled. Not since before she met Greg. In fact, if Sadie thinks about it, which she begins to do as she waits in the airport and thumbs through trashy celeb magazines, she stopped drawing around the same time she started working reception, because she thought benefits would be nice for a change. Which was around the same time that her best friend moved to Portland and she started going to clubs she wouldn’t have been caught dead in before, because that’s where her work friends were going. Which is how she met Greg. Who came after Adam. Who she met when she was bartending and who was an artist too and the two of them used to spend whole Saturday mornings sitting at the coffee shop together, sketching out notebooks worth of the ridiculous and the sublime.

++

Adam. Adam was the last time that Sadie remembers anything being well and truly new. It is halfway through this line of thought that Sadie begins to suspect she is giving up on the wrong things.

++

Under the water Sadie’s lungs are starting to burn. She’s counted by thousands up to nine, but it’s so peaceful down there she couldn’t bring herself to finish. The kids that are usually infesting the pool must all be at lunch or enforced naps, and the tourists are out doing touristy things. Miraculously, they’ve got the pool almost entirely to themselves, just Sadie and Greg and two other couples and the Swedes. Sadie is the only one in the water, posed in what they called the dead man’s float when she was a kid. She plans to stay in there as long as her lungs can hold.

++

A memory floats back to her, under the water. When Sadie was eleven, her grandmother came to visit. It was only her second trip, and since it was summer, the family took her to Coney Island. Sadie showed off her knowledge of the boardwalk, and steered her grandmother toward the shops and games, but her grandmother made a beeline for the Cyclone. She had never been on a rollercoaster before, she told Sadie. They didn’t have them in the old country. Sadie’s parents had gone for hot dogs, and Sadie wasn’t sure what to do. She was worried for her frail, seventy-two-year-old grandmother in general, never mind in a wooden car on a rickety rollercoaster that was older than she was. Sadie tried to talk her out of it. She told her grandmother that she wasn’t missing anything, that the coaster was overrated, that there was nothing exciting about it at all.

“So says you,” her grandmother answered. “Maybe it is true, but how will I know except to try? When you stop trying, Sadie, your life becomes blah. My life has been blah for too long.” She grabbed Sadie’s hand and marched her into the line, and nothing Sadie said during the wait could deter her.

Finally, they reached the front and were put, to Sadie’s utter horror, in the very first car of the coaster. As they were strapped in, Sadie’s grandmother turned to her granddaughter and grabbed her hand.

“The only way to get through this world,” she told Sadie, “is to flee from the blah and chase after every new thing with a greedy heart.”

++

Sadie feels the first drops hit her back just as she’s beginning to see spots from lack of air. Raindrops. It’s raining, a summer storm. Through the strange echo chamber of the water she can hear the Swedes sending up fake shrieks at the idea of getting wet, and she hears footsteps running for the hotel. Sadie stays in the dead man’s float a moment longer, until the drops have become a torrent, real water covering her better than the chlorinated stuff ever could. She drops to the bottom of the pool in a crouch, ready to burst up, and opens her eyes to the rain clouds overhead, to the new and different sky that’s waiting.

One one thousand, two one thousand

Ten.

Back and Forth, 2008

herb harp, accordianist

The accordion player, Herb Harp, had a nervous breakdown mid-squeeze.

He'd always been an impatient man, but a miserably unsuccessful impatient man. And so his impatience mainly manifested itself as impatience for the success he lacked.

Herb used to stay away at night, counting the small piles of currency that strangers pelted into his upturned bowler cap as he played popular songs downtown during lunch hours.

As he counted, Herb multiplied by swelling sums. He had it coming to him. The blood running through him was that of a rich man, that much he knew. But for some reason, try as he may, he couldn't bleed enough while performing to let the public know the same.

His voice was clear and beautiful, rasped just enough to lend authenticity, like the smudged words and bent corners of a palimpsest. The sound of the accordion, no matter what tune was played, was as warm and familiar as your best memory.

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But still he failed in those early years, just as he fails now.

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You might not remember this, but 1996 was the year of the great accordion revival. Grunge and its offshoots were crashing to the ground like limply-tossed meteorites and the boy band epoch hadn't yet began. And so 1996 was the year of the accordion.

Revisers of history have redacted it from the books, so I wouldn't recommend researching those brilliant times when accordions filled their lungs and bellowed loudly throughout the world, holding everyone rapt.

And we have Herb to thank for it. He was the trailblazer, the pack leader, the showman to end all showmen.

For that period of twelve months, Herb, with his dark sunglasses and bowler, was everywhere. He played inaugurations, Central Park, the world stage. He made love to countless gorgeous anonymous women. And men. He was a gossip column golden boy.

Best of all, his success made him so goddamn rich that, even when he counted without embellishment, the sums were so high that they made him woozy. So he hired someone to do the counting for him.

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But now we're here, December 15, 2008, on the low point of the downward curve of Herb Harp's success. Everything inside his body feels dismal, dull, and pointless. He aches, his arms have almost atrophied, but still he squeezes out some ugly sound. He's staring into his bedroom mirror, looking foolish, he knows, in his dark glasses and bowler.

He's mouthing to himself, "By god. By god. I wish to buy God." It sounds like the chorus to a song that was never written. And he know that, at this second, he's so broke that he couldn't even afford salvation, as if that were even desirable or an option.

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In the end, after Herb superglues the shatter of his life the best he can, the only only thing that that will preserve him is the same thing that preserves any of us. And that's the thought that there's some other place out there in the pitch ether where time slacks so much that who you were when you became who you think you should be is the you who will live forever.