ABOUT
THE AUTHOR
37 year old TEXAN. Desert recluse. Lover of vast space with no people to fuck it up, certain tobacco products, single malt scotch, politics, literature, beautiful women and all animals. My best friend is God. Please drive to the window... [June 2003]
AUTHOR'S OTHER TITLES (25) At Church With Amy (Poetry) Visiting Amy's lonesome grave in the desert. [84 words] Beyond The Realm Of Us (Short Stories) A look into the life of a young writer who is left to live with the ghost of his beloved soulmate who died at the hands of a serial killer. [4,530 words] [Literary Fiction] Casa Cantina De Loco (Short Stories) Crazy man, his favorite poet, Rainer Maria Rilke, and a sexy young girl... Marshall struggles with the complexity of gaining a new, less experienced lover or exploring the true reason for his post-div... [4,040 words] Evolving To Simplicity; Our Lack Of Human Evolution (Essays) A few thoughts on why our species is incapable of achieving peace at this particular time. My belief that it begins with one and with some insight into where I came from, I know that if I can do it, ... [5,571 words] Gone And Forgotten (Poetry) Death can only kill the memory. [115 words] Heather Dream 4,836 (Poetry) Another tease from the ghost of my soulmate. [131 words] Idee Fixe (Poetry) She's caught in my head. [37 words] I'm Psychotic And So Is My Friend Episode Six (Short Stories) From a collection of 'episodes' following two lifelong friends; one being obsessive compulsive, the other sadistically maniacal. [1,352 words] Kirby & I (Poetry) A late night walk in the desert with my cat, Kirby. [117 words] Kissing My Spanish Woman (Short Stories) The time I kissed a very beautiful, younger girl and found out the value of such a kiss. [1,970 words] Leaving On (Poetry) Words to family and friends prior to departing for a life of solitude. [208 words] Life On The Vine (Poetry) A question of one's place and when or if it will ever change. [117 words] Miles J. Jax, An Early Day In The Life (Short Stories) This section is an early excerpt from my novel. It will hopefully give the reader insight into the calamity of a broken-hearted man with two true loves, Lauren and fishing. [4,566 words] My First Ann Coulter Poem (Poetry) A poem about how I feel when watching and listening to the thoughts and ideas of the Constitutional Attorney and author, Ann Coulter. [162 words] Now (Poetry) A poem asking one to acknowledge and be that which one truly is. [36 words] [Mind] Pueblo (Poetry) Passing through a small West Texas town. [68 words] Send Me (Poetry) A poem asking God for the reason of my life. [128 words] September Dusk (Poetry) Reaction to desert sunset. [122 words] Silence & I (Poetry) Discovery of who's in control in absolute solitude. [20 words] The British Are Crying! The British Are Crying? (Essays) Editorial on the treatment of the 'detainees' at Camp X-Ray, Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. [1,239 words] The Life In You (Poetry) - [90 words] The Only Dream I Have Ever Won (Short Stories) This is actually a part of Chapter 7 of my novel in progress. The main character, Miles, is also the main character in the short story "Without Condition" (which is actually Ch. 2), only this time I ... [2,198 words] Through The Valley (Poetry) A walk through the valley of darkness. [891 words] Waiting For Heather (Poetry) A poem to my lost soulmate. [155 words] Without Condition (Short Stories) A free-spirited man struggles with his quest for true love as his life of drug addiction and strange women ultimately steer him toward his self-constructed destiny. [8,232 words] [Literary Fiction]
Chemo Pastry Party Branson Storm
This small town doesn’t seem so small after so much time alone in the mountains. This house is old, but home to fewer critters and crawlers. The air is a bit cooler at night due to a climb of five hundred feet above sea level. Sea level. That’s funny. There’s not a sea within a thousand miles in any direction and when has anything ever been level? The windows to this old house are all open and I hear the occasional siren mixed in with periodic traffic passing by. The trains’ pass through during the day, they storm through in route to some place other than where I live. At night they also come, but I relax and let them reel through me and churn my dreams with their heavy roll. “I haven’t heard this much noise since I was last in New York City.” I was speaking to my ex-wife. She lay in bed next to me, my ex-mother-in-law next to her, lying there like a sick seal chain-smoking long menthol cigarettes, coughing and bitching about something awry in her miserable life. I rise at the feel of someone else’s presence in the house. “Don’t get up, honey. Come back and lay down next to me.” My ex holds up the quilt and pats the mattress. “You can sleep inside me. You love to sleep that way.” I hear the menthol snort of the dying seal, “I have to piss”, and move down the hallway. In the darkness I see the back of a man’s head leaning against the window. He’s sitting on the porch bench; large dumbbells rise and fall with the flex of his wide, muscular neck. Immediately I recognize my brother passing the time with some late night exercise. “The door’s open. Why didn’t you just come in?”
“I didn’t want to wake you.”
“I was already awake. April and Doris and I are in bed together.” He looks ill at my words and my return expression reveals my concurrence. “Come in.”
“Mickey’s inside. He was here when I got here.”
I leave open the screen door for my brother and walk toward the hallway that leads to the bathroom, passing Mickey along the way. He stands behind the glass panes of an old red phone both. We see one another peripherally but I say nothing to him as he’s doing what he does best – working someone over on the phone. Someone’s going to get fucked and it’s not going to be my cousin. It never has been, all the years before I fell away from my mind, the family. Time changed. And I don’t know why.
At the doorway of the bathroom I notice Sammy, a childhood friend, seated on the toilet immersed in the sports page. It’s been twenty-five years since I’ve last seen this piece of shit. And to think I actually caught someone truly being himself, this was an odd blessing, a gift of holy proportion, a man being nothing more than what he is. To one another we say nothing. This would be pointless. He’s drowning in statistics and only the final word can save him.
Back to the porch Mickey is no longer on the phone. The phone is also no longer. Outside are a number of people stirring about the driveway. I know none of them. A man with a gray beard hands to me a plastic bag of candies and pastries. “Where’s my brother?”
“The big, mean lookin’ fella? Don’t say shit?”
“Yes.”
“He went inside.” Both his travel bag and dumbbells were gone.
I look inside the plastic bag. “The brownies are fudge and hemp,” says the bearded man. I devour two immediately, looking about at the strange faces milling in the moonlight like the ghosts of dead cattle. “There’s white chocolate covered mushrooms and the small ones that look like Christmas cookies are Scooby Snacks sprinkled with cocaine dust.”
I stuff my mouth. “These are quite delicious.”
“I made them myself. I was a baker in the army.”
“Fascinating. What the fuck would a naval vessel need with a banker?”
“I said baker.”
“My grandfather was a baker.”
I see Mickey milling about in the yellow light beneath the carport talking to a few of the strangers. Each one holds a plastic bag of goodies. Mickey holds two in one hand; the other holds a burning cigarette. I reach for another Scooby Snack and ask the bearded man what each bag went for. “Three hundred.” I bite the snack in half then put the other half inside the bag. Fuck it. I grab the other half and swallow it down.
Who do I know here? I have no money. My last five dollars went for Doris’ menthols earlier today. I sensed that because it was my house I was expected to pay. I looked around for one of my rich friends but found none. As I walk inside the house Mickey avoids my look. Fuck him. Fuck ‘em all. I lock the door behind me.
In the bathroom Sammy still dwells on the commode, he has several more pages to go. Three others stand in with him picking at their teeth in the mirror and drinking beer. Two of them are my wealthy friends from Tennessee; the other appears to be of some relation to Sammy; a sidekick, a boyfriend, a freeloader, a man in need of a toilet.
“We’re going home, honey, “ my ex says as she passes by the doorway, “It looks like you might need the space.”
“No. I want you to stay.” Looking at her mother, “You’re welcome to leave though. There’s a cemetery up the highway. You might ought to get an early start.” April tells me she loves me but leaves because her mother doesn’t feel welcome. “Good because she’s not.”
In the bathroom, William, an old high school friend and trust fund baby sighs with disgust at the sight of April and Doris. “No wonder you keep it so dark in here.”
“Where’s my brother?”
“Upstairs. Asleep.” Sammy spoke for the first time but did not look away from the paper. “Your brother said that if we made too much noise he’d kill us all.”
In the kitchen I drink cold water from a plastic cup. It was life cold and clean and holy.
Shutting the door to my bedroom I drop my shorts to the floor and toss my t-shirt aside in the darkness. The sheets are cool and soft but my dick is hot and hard. I scratch the thought of pissing in the garbage can and drift to sleep thinking of how nice it would be if Sammy hadn’t found the sports page.
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