final draft

 

I

 

With an eclipse in the sky,

a bottle of Remy by his side,

and a bowler on his head,

The Follower, inert and enervate,

pulled a paperback from his knap

sack entitled, “Smirking at the Unfinished

Novel in the Bottom Desk Drawer,” and

read a passage from it:

 

“Peckinpaugh was an enigma.  As a tragic hero, there was something Shakespearean about him.  There were also grounds to classify  him as a psychiatric case, bordering on insanity.  Twenty years of anxiety, temperament, and unhappiness had earned him his first heart attack at the age of forty-two.  He’d lived an unbelievably depressing, dirty, and drunk life; his home, to all practical purposes, was a room at the YMCA…”

 

The Follower closed the book,

stroked his forehead.

 

He was taking a new medication that

made him sleepy.

 

II

 

Returning to his sparse, dim room,

 

The Follower poured himself a glass of scotch,

 

and then began to dictate his biomythography

into a portable MP3 recorder.

 

“‘The Grinning Visage,’ subtitled ‘The Pathos of the Lie.’

Chapter one.  Like most people, he was complicated…”

 

The Follower paused the recorder and waited for the next line.

 

Fifteen minutes later, he spoke into the microphone again.

 

“Like most people he was complicated.

 He bled self-pity.  No one could take a joke so personally…”

 

That’s when it dawned on him that he was

writing about a truth

that would have killed most men.

 

He learned about this truth early in life.

 

There was always an obvious silence in the house,

the kind that cut gaping holes in him.

 

Nobody ever said good morning.

 

They just looked at each other and sighed.

 

Whenever words were exchanged,

they were usually uttered in harsh whispers.

 

 

Secrets were guarded and disclosed only

if they betrayed somebody’s trust.

 

Lies were elaborate and endless and never agonized over,

and truth was something that was always referred to in

the past tense.

 

The Follower poured another scotch and, forgetting to turn on the record button, spoke softly into the microphone.

 

“Weary, exhausted and fueled by my pretenses, I found rhythms and myths.  I wandered, then followed my faults to the ends of the needles being jabbed into my veins.  While on my way to waterfront motels, I developed intense distrust of women.  I was fascinated by them.  At the same time I felt I had no idea what was going on inside of me and to get close to a woman was to risk entrapment, imprisonment and claustrophobia.  But now there I was.  I was in America, God’s country, driving in an American Machine, taking deep breaths, then shallow ones…”

 

And in a breeze, The Follower’s consciousness was no more.

 

 

 

Reviews

[GlendaK]

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[Philip Gaber]

OK, I signed up. Now I wait?

[GlendaK]

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[GlendaK]

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[Philip Gaber]

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[GlendaK]

I am banned. But it's a wonderful site! Ur welcome (: Let me know how u like it. Whenever u get a chance. You'll be busy, I'm sure. You're awesome.

[Philip Gaber]

Why are you banned, you naughty girl?

[GlendaK]

No. I've only flirted with "you", John boy. It's a boring and long story. I know you will like the workings. I think they have video meetings.