Story a Day

Serenity

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I’ve been searching for serenity all my life.

Evenings are so nice. When I first moved in here there weren’t any trees and the sun beat down on the yard with full, brutal intensity. Years ago I used to work on my tan out there. I got so dark someone asked me if I was Latino. But that was years ago.

Looking out my back door to the right, three doors down, there’s a huge maple tree. It’s so big you can’t wrap your arms around it. It’s branches embrace the backyards of at least five city properties. It’s very old and probably was here when most of these houses were built back in the 19th century. It’s progeny are all over the area. They’re called “weed maples” because they’re so prolific.

Three saplings took root on my right hand fence line 10-15 years ago. About the same time two or three others began growing in my neighbor’s yard to the left. Once again they were on the fence line there. That’s probably because seeds that fall in the yards get mowed and don’t get a chance to grow.

So now, well over a decade later, my back yard is nicely shaded. The view from my porch shows the yard, 25 feet or so wide, with the “lawn” going a little more than twice that back toward the graveled parking lot. The yard ends about halfway to the street.

Beyond the parking lot is the alley that bisects this city block east to west. On the other side of the alley, facing this property, is a line of weathered, freshly painted garages that sport a variety of doors: segmented rollups, tracked sliders, and big swingers, hinged on one side.

There’s even a brick carriage house they’ve done some work on lately, it looks really good for its age. There are areas spaced apart in its brick construction, where bricks were left out in a diamond shaped pattern, allowing air to circulate through the second floor of the structure.

I don’t really know why the wall is perforated like that but at one time tobacco was a big cash crop around here. One of the small towns out in the country nearby became famous for its cigars. Perhaps the second floor was used for curing small amounts of the pernicious plant.

Or, maybe, since people kept horses in their carriage houses (instead of cars, okay?), the ventilation may have been to keep methane from building up on the second floor.

There might be some “grass” in the lawn, which I like to call my “botanical garden” because of the large number of different varieties of plants that inhabit it. Most are weeds, crabgrass, dandelions, thistles, and other common varieties. Some have pretty flowers. All are kept at bay by my landlord when he mows the yard.

There’s a spot under one of the trees on my fence line where nothing is growing, just a bare spot with decaying tree dirt lying in a circle pattern under the tree.

There are several families of squirrels that make things lively from time to time. Suddenly you’ll hear this ripping and tearing through the trees and you’ll notice a couple of the tree rats playing tag. They can make you laugh.

Along with the squirrels in my arboretum are the local cats that you see prowling from time to time. They usually keep a pretty low profile and all have that “I don’t care” attitude. Many belong to homes in the ‘hood and roam free but there are wild ones that are nearly feral, living by their wits—there are occasional road pizza kitties.

There’s one cat I call Meesha. Somehow years ago Meesha’s tail was cut off; I saw the injury shortly after it happened, apparently, the severed part was still connected by a small strip of fur.

I often wondered if it was my action that cut Meesha’s tail. Cats like to crawl up into the engine compartments of cars to keep warm. A radiator fan would do a pretty good job on a cat tail. I’ll never know, of course, and some weeks later Meesha showed up with the thing all healed up. I’ve seen her this year, she has a place across the street somewhere, behind the line of garages.

And then there’s the birds. I know very little about bird species but I can tell you I’ve seen dozens of different ones here in the back yard. Cardinals, robins, sparrows, grackles, doves, orioles, and even crows (who like the big tree) among the star studded avian cast.

Also flying, with incredible, unbelievable skill I might add, are bats that make their appearance at night. They munch on the myriad insects that gather around the dusk till dawn light mounted up on the third floor of the building.

I’ve looked in many places for serenity during the course of my life. I very much like sitting on my porch, plinking on my guitar, and watching the whole thing go down in harmony. It is serene.

Story a Day

Waves

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Deena’s sick again this morning. She’s okay in bed for now so I thought I might as well run down to St. Matthew’s and see if there’s any bread left. Had to call in this morning so I could take care of her, the chemo’s starting to leave a mark. I’ve been through two jobs since she was diagnosed with breast cancer last year. Probably get fired from this one too, maybe get one more absence out of Boss before he finally loses patience.

One last look at Deena, asleep now, and then out, down three flights to Corman St., a nod to old lady Beson as she’s coming up from the mailboxes, and then outside. My overall feeling of confinement, enclosure, eases substantially; it usually does when I get outside. I’m dealing with a lot inside. I should say we’re dealing with a lot, she’s the one who’s sick. We’ll get through it. Still, outside’s a whole other world.

There’s a farmer’s market two blocks over and I head in that direction. The church is over that way too. Sometimes you can get free bread at the market; the local grocery stores drop off their “day old” bread there on Mondays and Thursdays. St. Matthews gets their bread from a franchise bread store. I’m glad they don’t throw it away. I’ve never encountered anything that was stale—maybe past the “sell by” date but perfectly edible nonetheless.

A dumpster full of that kind of food, headed for the landfill or the incinerator or wherever, would be a crime. If you don’t think so then you’ve never been really hungry before and good lucky for you! Most of the people in the world know what I’m talking about. Think about it.

The bread we can scrounge makes a fair part of our diet. Any money I gain from employment goes to the rent and ongoing medical bills. Our food budget is almost non-existent but I did fill out an application for food stamps and the clerk said we’d probably get them. There are other charities, churches, and foodbanks around that help with food, thanks to people who care.

I haven’t discounted the common sense it makes to give food to the poor. Starving people tend to do desperate things. Lots of starving people could be a real problem especially if they’re living next to people that have more than plenty. It’s a pretty old story.

The people I see on the street aren’t on this train of thought, however. They pass by, everyone to his own. We all have things to do, I suppose. We all have good days and bad days, trials and tribulations, glory and 15 minutes of fame. It’s another aspect of being outside that helps me get my own troubles into perspective. It’s uplifting.

So I told my boss about Deena and what we’re going through and he told me he was sorry about our misfortune. He also told me he was responsible for making, packaging, and shipping as many brooms as he can every day. He went on to say that when one worker doesn’t come in it starts a ripple effect through the production line that ultimately impacts the bottom line. Boss said he understands the situation and will bend as far as he can but there are others who can do the job for him without added headaches. Boss is a good guy, he should have fired me months ago.

Got a couple bagels at the market! It’s late to be checking these places, they’re mostly picked over with little but scraps left, but these bagels were there and they’re not too hard.

It’s another block to St. Matthews. A gentle breeze off the lake rustles my hair and a wisp gets in my eye. I remove my ball cap, finger comb my hair, then reseat my cap, stray hairs contained for the moment. I look ahead and see the church door is still open, a good sign. There aren’t any people in line, though, not such a good sign.

When I get there I see that it’s over. Not even a mashed cupcake left. I guess I should have gone sooner but I couldn’t leave Deena huddled over the commode dry heaving like some kind of clogged garden hose.

I take a short detour to the lake. The breeze is lifting choppy little wavelets that splash onto the riprap and gabions of the seawall. They just keep coming, again and again, inexorable. I’m leaning with my arms on the galvanized pipe guardrail, hands together with my fingers interlocked and clutching my bagels just looking out over the water. Time passes. It’s a big lake, nothing but water on the horizon. And those little waves keep coming.

Deena and I are going to be okay. The doctor said she’ll fully recover and she has a very good chance of complete remission. We’re both young and strong and, like I said, we’ll get through it. We’re going to be like those little waves, we’re going to keep on coming. I smile and turn back toward the apartment.

Somebody, or something must be looking out for us. Those bagels are the only thing Deena and I will have to eat today.

Story a Day

Memorial

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(Memorial Day Tribute to the Brave)

It’s amazing the things you think of when you don’t have a lot of time. Time’s pretty short for me. I’ve started an action that probably won’t end well. Had to do it, though.

For some reason the first thing I think of is the look on my little brother’s face when he won a gold medal at a grade school track meet. He’d run the 100 yard dash in 10.6 seconds, beating his closest competitor by nearly half a second. I remember his smile as they gave him his medal at the award ceremony. It was an easy smile, not terribly joyous or strained, just an easy smile that spoke of a new found confidence, and he was standing a little straighter.

I remember thinking ‘there goes little brother.’ There were two of us guys and a sister older than Benj in our family. How much that moment meant for him, how much that little personal victory would shape his life. I loved him for it because I knew how he felt, I was ‘little brother’ too. I was happy for him.

There was this dog I ran over with my car. That was pretty sad.

The roller coaster was almost at the top of the metal hill. Everyone waiting for the exhilarating drop from the crest. And it comes! Screams of hysterical laughter, mom right behind us yelling like a banshee just like everyone else. Colors—yellow, red, chartreuse, sky blue, orange, chlorophyll green, indigo, all swirl and pinwheel by as the plummeting coaster passes through the carnival scene in humid mid summer. Cotton candy and funnel cake, frying sausage and onions, redolent and wafting. King’s Dominion was it? Yeah, King’s Dominion.

So I put my tassel on the left side. I had graduated from High School. So now what? I should join the Army and get that over with while I’m still young, I thought. Get an education afterwards. Funny, how I was so practical about it. I had my future all mapped out and it looked pretty rosy!

Sarah Jenson was so beautiful. I remember staring at her in class. I couldn’t help myself, the curve of her cheek, the satiny luster of her skin, her lips so smooth and graceful when she smiled, her hair fine and the color of dark honey, her smell—was that what ambrosia smells like?

It was night and we made camp at the public campground. Pretty nice, really, rest rooms with showers, cast iron grills and fire pits. We had the bikes all chained up to an oak tree and pitched our tents nearby. I wondered at the fun we were having. Everyone pitching in to get where we were going, only a big circle but so worth the trip. A fire under the stars and I remember looking at all those unbelievably hopeful, optimistic faces, firelight dancing with dreams. How could the world do without anyone of us?

And dad said, “you okay?”

“I think so,” I replied and got up from the ground, a rouge scrape on my knee just beginning to show tiny dark crimson pinpoints. I picked up the bike. The handlebar was off center so I straddled the front wheel and wrenched the bar a little in the right direction. Checked it, gave it another little wrench, checked again, then said, “What am I doing wrong?”

“Trying too hard if anything,” dad said.

And now I’m landing on that grenade, just like I planned. Kevlar might save me. You guys live good full lives, okay? Make this worth something, okay? Shoulda said something to Sarah . . .

Story a Day

Gemini Virgins

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They threw the young virgin down at the feet of the High Priest. Defiant, she sprang to her feet only to meet a soldier’s truncheon that knocked her again to the floor. Black dots and stars impaired her vision as she struggled to her hands and knees, her swaying head hanging as she regained her senses.

“Stay down,” a soldier hissed from behind.

The High Priest of the Order of Moul, resplendent in a carnelian silk toga, stood before a throne on a circular dais three steps above the young girl. “You would do well to behave, young lady,” he said, “I’m told you’re a virgin.” He looked over to one of the two guards behind her and said, “She’s been checked, right?” The guard nodded.

The priest looked down, a grim, tight lipped smile on his hawkish face. “Yes, you’d do well to behave,” he said, “I’m going to offer you a wonderful opportunity.”

She raised her head, seeing first his sandaled feet, the thongs looked like woven gold, then the red drape of his toga covering his skeletal frame, then the severe narrow face on his hairless head wearing a ludicrous gold onion dome headpiece. She would have laughed but wasn’t really feeling very funny at the moment. Indeed, she was fairly pissed off. She sat back on her knees, poker faced, and said nothing.

“Nothing to say? Don’t you want to know why you’ve been brought here? What’s your name?” the priest asked.

She glared at him, “drop dead.”

His smile widened, progress—she’s talking, he thought. “What harm will it do to tell me your name?”

The guard prodded her with the butt end of his ceremonial lance. Answer!” he growled.

Sullen, “Wyx.”

The priest grinned, she noticed he had bad teeth. “Ah, Wyx,” he said unctuously, “was that so hard?” Dropping his hands, he gathered his toga and sat back into the ornate golden chair. “You’ve heard of the Gemini Virgins?”

“Sure,” she said, “everybody has. Those are the poor bitches you sacrifice to that god you worship.”

“Moul forgive you,” the priest said, tipping his head slightly and touching his forehead with his thumb and index finger. “The Gemini are twins, my dear,” he said, “one twin is sacrificed to Moul and the other gets to serve our priests and bear our children, a great honor I might add. Female children automatically become Gemini, males become our priests. You probably know that.”

“Why would I want to have any part in your stupid religion?” she snarled.

A benign expression came over the priest. “It’s a good life. We take care of our own quite well. By keeping the Order ‘all in the family,’ so to speak, we’ve managed to maintain dominion over this world for more than a century.”

“Ha! Good for you, eh?” Wyx fairly spit the words at him. “Meanwhile the rest of us pay your ‘tithe’ or starve, right?”

“Oh, you have that wrong,” said the priest, his eyes narrowing, “our followers pay the tithe because they believe!”

“Believe or starve, you mean.”

The priest tried mightily to suppress a yawn, which he hid behind the back of his hand, and sighed, “You will be a Gemini.” He arched his brow and his nostrils flared slightly, “What I need to know right now is which part you will play, a believer and lifetime servant of the Order, or the sacrifice to Moul. Choose!”

“Any religion that forces you to believe on pain of death sucks,” Wyx said, “and can’t possibly be anything good. You suck, your church sucks, everything about you sucks!” She spit at him right before the guard hit her with the club again.

The High Priest of the Order of Moul casually waved, flexing his fingertips with a sweeping motion, “Take her. You know what to do.”

Story a Day

Evident

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He could feel the sun almost directly overhead. He mopped his brow with an already damp red paisley handkerchief, stuffed the cloth into a back pocket and knelt. In front of him was a large mound of threshed wheat that he was winnowing before it could be ground into flour at the mill down by the stream.

With a big coffee can he put a couple scoops of wheat into the woven bamboo basket he was using. He stood up and with a quick upward motion tossed the wheat into the air. A light breeze that was always present on the knoll where he was working wafted dust, grit, and other detritus from the grain downwind. There was a thick carpet of chaff on the ground extending in that direction.

After several tosses he put his fingers into the wheat in the basket, ran some lightly between his thumb and fingers. He gave the wheat a few more tosses, repeated his test, then dumped the wheat onto a growing pile of grains ready for the mill.

He heard a small voice behind him. “Papo,” it said. It was Andalisha, his granddaughter. “Mumu says come in, it’s lunchtime.”

“Okay,” he said, “Let’s go.” He dropped the basket at his feet and reached out to find Andy’s left arm right where he expected it. Papo had been blinded 20 years ago fighting a fire at a neighbor’s farm. An almost empty kerosene can had exploded, spraying his face with shrapnel and fire.

She led him down the hill toward the stone cottage next to the mill. She was unusually quiet today, ordinarily she would talk his ear off. He reached over and touched her cheek and felt a wet track. “You’ve been crying,” he observed, “Why so sad?”

“Sendru is going to the harvest celebration with Idris,” she said bitterly. “He doesn’t even like Idris. She’s doing it just to get at me, I know it. She knows how I feel about him.”

“Ohh, I see,” the old man said.

“He’s already told me he doesn’t like her or her family,” she pouted, “and now he’s going to the grange with her. And he won’t even talk to me about it. I’ve asked him several times and all he says is, ‘later,’ and he walks away.”

The Conrads, Idris’s parents, were satraps for the local warlord and they owned the mill. In fact, they owned nearly everything in the valley. Andalisha’s father, Papo’s son, operated the mill for the Conrads. He wasn’t exactly tied to the land or the job, he could pick up and leave if he wanted but leaving in these troubled times wasn’t a very good idea. There was nowhere to go where it was different. His tacit serfdom, tantamount to the real thing, kept him and everyone else in the valley under the thumbs of the Conrads.

Over a century ago the Great Collapse, caused by a worm infecting the Internet that ruined the infrastructure of anything connected to it, knocked civilization back to the middle ages. With the cities in flames and most of their inhabitants dead fighting each other during the meltdown, the remnants of civilization, rural survivors mostly, degenerated into isolated pockets of Medieval feudalism. Warlords and their henchmen control large geographic areas and are always at each other’s throats—dark days indeed.

“Sendru may not have any choice, you know,” Papo said. “He must obey the Conrads. They can easily give his family’s farm to someone else to work and there would be nothing they could do about it.”

Andalisha had never thought about politics or power before, her naiveté nonplussed. She wrinkled her brow and said softly, “You mean they told Sendru he had to take Idris to the celebration or they would hurt him and his family?”

Papo could see the furrows between her eyebrows in spite of his handicap. Her voice didn’t sound so quite so childish as it did 5 minutes ago. “I’m afraid so, child,” he said.

Andalisha, deep in thought, led her grandfather across the yard to the cottage’s Dutch door in silence. Before she opened the door she turned to her grandfather and gravely said, “That’s not right.”

With a tight, humorless smile Papo shook his head. He said wearily, “and so it isn’t, child. But so it will remain until someone changes it.”

The young girl’s eyes became slits under her lowered brows as she digested her epiphany. “Ohh, I see,” she said.

Story a Day

What Goes Around

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Ha! I thought as I escaped with my prize. No one saw me pick up the gig bag and there was no one in the parking lot outside Turbo Mike’s Bar and Grille. I got into my beat up old washed out blue Ford Escort and drove home. I was thinking I could probably get maybe $50 to $100 for the bag’s contents. That harp player wasn’t that good anyway so now he has a good excuse to quit. Not a big score but it would help the wheels keep turning a little longer.

Stopped at a minute market for some cigs and lit one after getting back into the car. I blew out that first puff then reached over and unzipped the bag. Along with a mess of wires, there were 3 mics, all Shures, not top shelf but durable and reliable. In a long case were a dozen or so harmonicas, most of them Blues Harps, a Hohner industry standard. To buy that stuff new would run about $500 but the most I could hope for from a black marketeer would be maybe a fifth of that.

How do I know? Some time ago, when I was young and innocent, I was leaving a bar while the band was moving their equipment. They were all inside at the moment and I saw one of the guitar cases leaning against the trailer, out of sight of the doorway and the rest of the bar. I was in a fairly desperate state then, I barely had enough to buy a couple beers, so I gave in to the temptation and snatched it. Heavier than I anticipated but I walked it around the corner to my car and made a clean getaway.

Inside the form fit case was a 1958 gold top Les Paul, and though I didn’t know it at the time the antique guitar was worth a small fortune. I found that out when I took it to a friend of mine in Arkansas who collects guitars and he forked over $1500 without blinking. Just by the way, I found out later I got robbed, it was worth at least five times that amount then, astronomical today.

Well, anyways, I had found a new and lucrative career and I ran with it. You can make a pretty good living ripping off garage bands in the organized confusion that goes along with moving equipment. And the take is usually pretty good. Garage, basement amateurs usually throw money at their musicianship; they have regular jobs and more money than they know what to do with. So they often have expensive instruments they don’t have the wherewithal—skill or talent—to use. They don’t sound any better on a $4,000 bass than they would on the $150 special because they can’t really play the thing to begin with. All the better for me, the prizes have been good!

I took one of the harps out of the bag. It was a Marine Band Hohner and it had an “A” stamped to one side. I blew on it and liked the sound. I put it down in the car’s console and zipped up the bag. Actually got $150 for the bag and its contents when I sold it to a “friend.”

Not too long ago I finally got caught stealing a power stack. Probably should have passed on it but it was the only opportunity I had that night. I needed the money so I gave it a shot. The thing was on wheels and weighed about 150 pounds. Bet you could hear it rolling across the parking lot halfway down the street. Anyways, they threw me into county lockup where I languished for the better part of a year.

Thing is, I had that old harp with me, I used to blow on it from time to time. It relaxes me in a way. While I was in the can I began to practice on it. I got pretty damn good pretty quick. I amazed myself. One of the other inmates played guitar pretty good and we’d get some good jams going. We were a big hit with the other guys, they said we were “headhunters.”

Since then me and the guitar player have been quite successful doing local gigs. People leave our gigs raving about how ‘unbelievable’ we are. They can’t believe we get that much music out of a guitar and a harmonica. Frankly, it was a new experience for me, I was actually earning my living instead of stealing it. It has made me feel pretty good. There’s something to be said for deserving what you get in life—at least when you get good things.

It’s funny the things you remember.

So, here’s the thing. Me and the guitar player are here in New York City for a showcase performance. Showcase entry fee was $500. We’re sure to meet key people, agents, managers, promoters, who will take us to the next level. We’re scheduled to go on next but I’m afraid it’s not going to happen. We may or may not get this opportunity again, who knows?

Somebody stole my damn gig bag and no one else here plays harmonica.

Story a Day

Iniquitous

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Dark, ugly smoke came through the cracks around the windows, curled upward, rappelled around the soffits then sublimated across the slate shingles, wispy tendrils reaching into the damp morning air like so many undulating fingers. Through a bay window to the right of the front door, inside toward the rear of the house, a fierce, coruscating red glow could be seen in spite of the murky smoke inside.

Suddenly something inside exploded with a huge Kcerrrrummmppp!!! and the front door blew off its hinges and out into the street. All the windows in the house sent flying glass shrapnel in every direction. With the fire open to the air the beautiful, rustic stone rancher almost immediately became fully engulfed in flame.

My great grandfather, in his twenties at the time, stood there with his arm around Grama and they watched their home burn. At about the same time the local volunteers pulled up with a team of horses lugging a fire pump.

Chief Wilson jumped down and ran over to him. A couple of the other men began to unlimber hoses while the rest tossed sandbags into the small stream near the house, damming a pool to feed the pump.

Removing his helmet and wiping his brow, the fire chief said, “Looks like we’re too late, Jim.”

“Yeah, but we all got out,” great grandfather said. “That’s the important thing. I think the furnace just blew.”

The fire totally destroyed the comfy home, the slate roof finally collapsing into the stone shell, which smoldered for more than a week. Great Grampa and Grama, and Shamus, their golden retriever, were offered and gratefully took shelter at their closest neighbors, the Nicholsons, just down the road. The Nicholson’s turned their family room over to Great Grama and Grampa and told them they could stay there for as long as they needed.

Two weeks later, on a Friday, all the businesses in town closed at noon and every able bodied man, woman, and child went to Great Grama and Grampa’s house and began to clear away the mess. And they came for the long haul. Wagons laden with new construction materials arrived and everyone, each to their talent and skill, pitched in. By Sunday night Great Grama and Grampa’s house was rebuilt and ready to use. That’s how they did it in the old days.

At least that’s how my grandfather used to tell the story. I always thought it wonderful how his friends and neighbors got together to help his father. All the more pertinent now as I watch my own home burn to the ground. Like Great Grama and Grampa we all got out, so we’ve been lucky that way. Still, it’s hard to watch everything for which you’ve been working for years go up in smoke.

Sandra Bulk, my insurance agent, picking her way carefully over hoses going this way and that on the lawn, gets up to me and, ruefully shaking her head, says, “I was watching 50 Shades of Grey when you called. I dropped everything and came right away!” She looked at what was left of my house. “Looks like it’s too late to save anything.” I tell her we all got out and that’s the important thing.

“I was talking to the Chief,” she says. “We might have a problem.”

“Ohh?”

“It seems the flooded creek undercut part of your back yard and dropped your fuel tank about 8 inches. The broken fuel line and the shorted pump circuit are what apparently started your fire.” She was most apologetic, “Since flood waters caused the damage to your house—and you don’t have flood insurance—you’re not covered for this.”

I almost fell down. “What?!” I say, flabbergasted. “I’ve been paying that stiff premium for 18 years and now that I need it, you’re telling me I’m screwed? Lady, my HOUSE just burned down. What does that have to do with floods?”

“I’m afraid that’s it,” she says. “Of course the fire marshal will investigate but the chief said it’s pretty obvious what happened.”

“And there’s no way you can help us?” I ask, not believing what I’m hearing. “What can we do?”

“Well,” she says, “at least there’s the Red Cross. There’s nothing I can do for you. Get some flood insurance next time—I have several policies available.” She fairly backs away from me for a short distance. “I’m sorry,” she says, then turns to go finish watching her movie.

Story a Day

What’s In a Name?

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“Ohhh! I got one!” Darin said as he splashed in the creek bed. With both hands he tossed the dripping flat rock he was holding downstream where it was swallowed, gulped, by the chuckling brook. “Look, it’s a big one!”

While looking intently into the water at his feet, Darin suddenly raised an open palm and cried, “Don’t stir it up! We’ll lose it.”

Mik had begun to plod down through the creek but, realizing his mistake, got up on the bank. He crossed to where Darin was standing. “There it is,” Darin said, pointing a dark finger at something under the surface.

It was motionless, but Mik saw it there. “Let’s catch it,” he whispered, like it was some kind of great conspiracy.

“Don’t let it pinch you. That one’s big enough to hurt,” Darin said.

It was a crawfish, a very dark crawfish. “Ha,” Mik laughed, “It’s a nigga crawdad.”

“Hey, ya blue eyed devil, did ya ever see a cracker crawdad?” his friend said. Thus began the routine that had become, in one form or another, almost a ritual between them.

“There ain’t no white crawdads,” Mik said. “Only niggas in this stream it seems.”

Darin frowned with deep wrinkles in his forehead, “You’re not allowed to say that word, whitie. Now I’ve got to kick your ass.”

“Just a minute, partner” Mik said, holding up his hand with the stop motion. “Why can’t I say that word? You say it all the time. Dag, we can go up on the street and in less than five minutes some noisy ass car will go by with the singer singin’. ‘nigga, nigga, nigga!’”

“Doesn’t count,” Darin said, “that’s black music and black people are allowed to say nigga.”

“But what if it’s a white guy driving the car? Is he sayin’ nigga or is it the record artist sayin’ it?”

“Alls I know is that white people aren’t allowed to say ‘nigger,’” Darin retorted with an arch look.

“So I’m not allowed to say nigga because of the color of my skin? I have to be afraid to say something—because of the color of my skin?”

Darin smiled and they both said together, laughing, “. . . Isn’t that just exactly what black folks have been pissing and moaning about for the last couple hundred years?”

Darin and Mik met during a rainy day when they were both about 5 years old; they both lived on the fourth floor in the same building. Their parents weren’t real chummy with each other, sociable but not overly friendly. The two boys, however, found they had plenty to talk about, liked each other’s toys, didn’t mind sharing, and, in general, really hit it off. They’d been fast friends ever since.

“So when do you want to kick my ass?” Mik asked, grinning.

With a lightning move Darin reached down, splashing, and captured the crawdad. He laughed as he stood up, his catch in his hand. He chuckled and shrugged, “I’ll do it tomorrow—besides, we got bigger fish to fry, like what are we gonna do with this here nigga crawdad?”

Story a Day

Hidden Levels

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He was on his surf board on the Maintenance bus and down to level 20, the skybox there was simply a starry night. He was on his second sweep through the level. Somewhere down here there are at least five more levels, he thought, but where? I must be missing something.

Maintenance section is totally operated and controlled by Central AI, human citizens of the Commonality of course eschewing anything to do with something so mundane. Aside from an occasional robotic transport there were no other vehicles on the bus. Random was the first human visitor here in several decades according to the section log. So far everything seemed unremarkable—normal for a dimly lit section of the Commonality that sees no traffic.

The sector’s main bus, only two lanes in either direction, wound through massive, plain utilitarian structures that bore iconic sigils and legends like: hydroponics, mechanical power transfer, electronic power transfer, hydrology, weather mitigation, plumbing, tectonics, circuitry, and on and on.

One structure, back away from the bus, had “Shipping and Receiving” written under the sigil of a robot lifting a box. What’s shipping and receiving? he wondered. None of this makes any sense. After the second circuit of the area he pulled up and hung in the space over the bus near the entrance ramp from level 19.

He began his third sweep, proceeding along the bus at a slow rate. Wong said to look in the miscellaneous stacks on level 25, a non-existent level as far as Random knew. He accelerated and surfed his way to the level 20 miscellaneous section.

He slowed after turning in to the massive square building, trying to observe and note everything he came across. Stacks, arranged in a grid pattern, continued to the distant far wall of the storage area and rose to the almost equally distant ceiling.

Nothing remarkable jumped out at him as he went through the stacks except for one that was designated “Supervision,” Even with Blink and his arsenal of program crackers and manipulators, the stack resisted every effort at entrance. “Might be a dummy,” Blink offered over the neural connection.

“Looks like it,” Random replied. “What could possibly need ‘supervision’ from the maintenance department?”

“Perhaps something unrelated to the Commonality?” Blink suggested.

Impossible. Random gave a shrug and a little “hmmf,” left the maintenance section and continued his sweep until he had returned to the starting point. Again, he started down the sector bus slowly, sure he was missing something. Shipping and Receiving? What does maintenance, Random wondered, have to do with shipping and receiving? Shipping and receiving materials and programming was handled in the higher levels of the Commerce section, every school child knew this.

He turned off the bus and traveled a narrow access lane to enter the plain, square Shipping and Receiving building. The stacks were all closed and unused. Toward the end of his exploration, deep into the blank stacks, Random saw something familiar. Ahhh, here’s something—a stack labeled “Supervision.” When he tried to access the stack he was immediately stymied with a password query. “Ultra-pass and password required for entrance,” the security screen said.

“What’s an Ultra-pass?” he asked out loud.

Blink responded, “No idea. Let me look . . .” Several minutes later his office AI said, “I think I’ve found something. It’s very old and it took a deep scan to find it . . .”

Random tapped his foot on the surfboard. Blink always took great pleasure in baiting Random. “Okay,” Random said impatiently, “spit it out, knucklehead.”

Blink gave his version of subdued laughter and said, “I found an ‘Ultra-pass’ in the Commonality base code that was to be used in case of ‘dire’ emergency. It’s right out in the open too, there’s no security protection at all. Sending to your cache now . . .”

Random applied the pass. The security screen flashed, “Ultra-pass accepted.” Then it asked for a password. “Okay, buddy, do your stuff,” he said to Blink who began a bulk search for the key. Again, Random was surprised by the lack of security because in less than 30 seconds Blink came up with ‘rebirth’ as the password.

Random entered the word and the security screen said, “Welcome!” He was in.

Story a Day

Cry for Help: The Dying TV

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I was walking down the alley between Locust and Walnut, coming back from my workout around the park, when I spied another one of those ubiquitous things you seem to see around all the time these days. It was, like, half a television, half an analog television, picture tube and a few strands of colored wire protruding from a plastic frame. Lying beside it, crushed into a couple dozen pieces, was the plastic from the rear of the device. Most of the circuitry was missing.

I wouldn’t have to walk too far down the alleys before finding a similar scene of grisly electronic carnage. Such tableau, multiple carcasses even, seem to be quite commonplace, at least for the time being.

I’m thinking, since all analog TVs are headed for the recycle bin in the next couple years, many folks have the problem of just what to do with that $800, 200 lb., doorstop that they just replaced with a $150 High Definition TV from South Korea. A replacement that, incidentally, produces three times the picture size, incredible image quality, and better sound and only weighs about 10 lbs.

It seems some folks have figured out that television circuitry is made using precious metals, gold, silver, platinum, and such like. The TV carcass tableau are what’s left after the integrated circuit boards are removed. The TVs may have been left out on the street, picked up by an ‘entrepreneur’ and transported to some location nowhere near his or her own residence, eviscerated and abandoned.

So, actually, I’m kind of blind to that sort of thing when I’m out on my walks. However, as I was passing this particular shatter I saw, out of the corner of my eye, a bright flashy movement. The sun glinting off some shiny surface, I mentally shrugged and was about to dismiss it when I heard a small, tiny voice saying, “Help me!”

I froze in my tracks. Yes, I thought, now it’s finally happened. I’ve finally gone over the edge of the map to that part that says “Here there be dragons.”

And then I heard it again–there was no mistaking it. “Help me!” it implored. It was a tiny, scratchy little voice. Just like the trapped fly at the end of “The Fly.” Not the one with Jeff Goldblum, the old 1950’s one with David Hedison. I stared at the wretched TV. There! I saw the flash again and saw that it came from a piece of windblown foil. But that little voice . . . “Help me!”

Okay, so I’m crazy! I can afford to be gullible. “Help you? How can I help you?” I said in the direction of the wreck.

“Take me. Put me back together. I still have life! I can still be your everything!” it squeaked.

I said, “You’re a broken, smashed up, beaten down, destroyed television. How could I possibly put you back together? You don’t have any circuitry left at all, not even a power switch.”

“You’re making a big mistake,” the voice said. “I can give you anything you want.”

“Like you’re some kind of genie, eh?” I queried, “three wishes and all that, right?”

“Oh no, much more than a genie,” it said, “much more than three wishes. Everything and anything you want can be yours and so much more. Just fix me up and you’ll see. Don’t think about it; just do it!”

Having endless wishes come true sounded pretty good. Since I’d finally lost it I thought I might as well play along. What can it hurt? And then it hit me.

“You been promising me that all my life, bitch,” I said as I turned and continued on down the alley.