THE CLOSET (The Runaway -- XII)

When Josh returned to the hotel room, Nikko had not yet returned. He kicked off his shoes and sat on the chair by the window. Cars zoomed below on the highway, heading south, which made him miss his parents, his room, Absalom, and he even though he and Nikko had decided not to call their families, not to call anyone, he thought it might not hurt to leave a message they were okay.

 

The mattress sagged on Nik’s side of the bed, the side closest to the phone. A red light blinked. Nikko must have called, that was why he hadn’t returned.

Josh picked up the phone and punched zero.

“Yes?” a voice on the other end said.

“Room 602 has a message,” Josh said.

A pause. “Yes.” A thick voice. “You need to pay up for this week. Your bill was due yesterday.”

“Okay. That’s all?”

“Yes.”

Josh blinked to hide his disappointment. He went to the bathroom to wipe his face before he cried, then took a shower. Water pattered his back warm like rain and calmed him. He thought he heard the door to the room open, and he washed faster, happy Nik was back, but when he came out the room was empty. It was four. Time to go sing, to earn his keep. He toweled quickly.

Anger clotted his stomach. Damn Nikko. Where the hell was he? He pulled on jeans and finger-combed his snarled hair into place. He would have to play solo, they needed the cash. Josh threw on his coat. The closet door rattled along its track. He reached in for his guitar.

Josh felt air. Emptiness. He flipped on the light. The guitar was gone. He double-checked. Nothing but plastic hangers. Where the hell was his guitar?

He slammed the door. The mirror quivered, making his reflection waver. He raised his fist, wanting to punch the glass, punch his reflection. How could he have been so stupid to leave home?

The sun left a wan stain of light on the floor. He would go find Nik.

 

***

Installment 12 in THE RUNAWAY. To read more, go HERE and follow the crumbs. Thank you for reading my words. Peace...

School Is In

It is 5:30 in the morning. Crickets sing their melancholy, and the open windows let in the cool, darl air. In less than an hour, my son's alarm clock will begin to play whatever rock music plays at this time of the morning. He will tumble from bed, silent, unused to the dark, unused to the gentle prodding from bathroom to breakfast table to backpack.

After my son trudges up the hill to the bus stop, I will wake my daughter, wrapped in her blankets with dolls and stuffies. Her body will feel warm, and I will have the urge to lie beside her. She has more time to prepare for the bus that takes her away most mornings for the next nine months to school.

A bittersweet day. This has been a good summer--even I found the time to slow down--yet I welcome the return to schedule, to routine. And this morning, as every morning of the first day of school, I will find myself weepy-eyed as the yellow bus pulls away from the curb. Peace...

COFFEE IN CHINATOWN (The Runaway--XI)

When Josh left the hotel on the eleventh day, a cool brackish wind blew off the bay and made him shiver. He bought a coffee from the McDonald’s in Chinatown.  Prostitutes gathered for breakfast, their sequins and satin rumpled and stained. Doctors and nurses rushed in for coffee and biscuits, a blur of blue and green, their clogs squeaking on the restaurant floor. Josh sat at a stool by the window. Pedestrians hurried past, heads bowed against the wind, umbrellas at the ready.

Josh day-dreamed about lying in bed back in Maryland, the muffled sound of his parents talking over eggs and bacon filtering up the stairwell. Across the street he saw Nikko walking with another man in a black leather trench coat. Josh could not see the man’s face, but he could see his silver hair pulled back into a small pony-tail. The man gripped Nik’s arm, and even though Nik talked and even laughed, there was something pinched about his face that showed he was scared.

Josh’s stomach burned. The coffee filled him with nausea. He pitched the half-full cup and ran out the door. Cars and buses flew by. The man disappeared around the corner. The light flipped to green and Josh bolted across the street, almost bowling over a bent-over Chinese man pushing a wagon filled with handbags and bright scarves. By the time Josh reached the corner, he saw no sign of Nik or the man. Boarded-up warehouses lined the short block and, at the end, a ramp led to the roar of the highway. A crumpled piece of newspaper blew towards him and it began to rain.

 

The eleventh installment of The Runaway. To read the rest, go ==> HERE. As always, I appreciate you taking the time to read my words. Peace...

Literal Literary Road Trip

Route 95 from Baltimore to Boston is a blur of asphalt, trucks, and toll booths. Forest and rolling farmland dominate the Maryland landscape. From the New Jersey turnpike, New York City looms over swamp and industrial dross, skyscrapers veiled in mist.With its soaring silver cables, the GW bridge takes us into the City full of promise, but the Bronx itself is a sunken roadway, filled with potholes and graffiti-inscribed brick buildings. McDonalds arches glow yellow in the lower end of Connecticut, then give way to the granite that marks the rocky earth of Massachusetts. Through all, the faint smell of sea filters past dieseled exhaust.

The journey is an exhausting one. A good trip will take 6 hours or so, no stops; a bad one nine hours or more. All made worse by the need to urinate, to quench a thirst or stop a headache, the whine of adolescents in the backseat. The boredom.

Traveling north, excitement mounts as we pass the green signs denoting location. The Larchmont, NY exit makes me nostalgic for a place I have never literally visited, the birthplace of Benjamin, the protagonist of BRIGHTER THAN BRIGHT. From a distance, the outline of a crane atop a growing building anchoring southernmost Manhattan reminds me of the horrors September 11, 2001, and of how Ben's father perishes there in PURE.

We gas up at the Vince Lombardo rest stop at the top of the NJ Pike, and it is here that Nikko and Josh stop in the Greyhound as they flee Maryland for Boston in THE MINISTER'S WIFE. Signs for Cape Cod remind me that Ben first told Phoebe he loved her on the ferry to the Vineyard, that they made love in the sand, and it was a memory that got him through his descent into madness.


Of course, I have my own memories of many of these places. My characters are so real to me, the places they visit theirs and mine, that the memories all intermingle and sometimes, I forget where my imagination begins and ends. But for all my novels, New England is a place of origin or ending; returning there always invigorates my writing, and the lives of my creations.

What place evokes your muse? What lands do you take and twist their reality to make home for your characters? What is your place?

Peace...

COCHINOS Up @ MiCROW

My small story Cochinos up at the fabulous MiCROW. The summer theme is home, and what a collection of dark and delicious stories, images, and poems. A huge thank you to Michael Solender, editor and writer extra-ordinaire for including my work.

I'm out of commission the rest of this week, summering with limited internet. Fill your time with the fine reads at MiCROW. Catch you soon. Peace...

BUSKING In BOSTON (The Runaway--X)

THEY STAYED AT THE HOTEL. Josh wanted to move to the Y, the hostel had a double for $49, but Nik said no, they had lock-in at midnight and how would they be able to perform on street corners if they could not stay out past midnight? Besides, he said, we have enough money to last us a month.

Mornings, while Nik was gone, Josh wandered the city. He walked to the harbor and watched ferries and cruise ships come and go, felt the briny humidity curl his hair and gloss his skin. He stumbled into Little Italy and walked the uneven cobbled streets, his mouth watering from coffee and garlic, the pizza and sweet pastry; one morning, he allowed himself to spend two bucks for a cannoli, the sweet ricotta smearing his fingers as he crunched down on the crisp shell. He spent little time on Newbury Street, with its open air restaurants and boutiques, the women in their spiky Manolo Blahniks and the men in silky Armani; in his jeans, slick from dirt and grime, he did not belong there. Afternoons, when he returned to the room, Nikko would be laying face down on the bed, arms and legs spread-eagled, deep asleep. Josh would sit on the hard chair, warmed by the wan streaky sun, and watch Nik sleep, heard him moan and sometimes thrash in the sheets.

Josh worried where Nik went at night, and every night before he dropped to sleep, Josh vowed to follow his friend. But when the door clicked open, the rectangle of light thrown on the bed, Josh found himself too tired and too scared to slip on his shoes and jacket and follow his friend into the dark.

After Nik woke from his afternoon nap and showered, they took their backpacks and the guitar and headed to Harvard Square. They never set up in the main part of the square, but on a side street, in front of Herrell’s ice cream or on a street shooting off towards Central Square. The cops had run them off the first night because they didn’t have a license.

The first few nights they made about thirty dollars, bills and change dropped in Josh’s open guitar case. Singing on the sidewalk, Nik’s pure voice thrown against his in harmony, the heft of the guitar in his hands, hearing the cling of quarters and the sound of applause, Josh realized he was happy. All the grit, the weariness and loneliness,  the lean edge of hunger gnawing at his stomach, all the worry that thrummed under his ribcage while Nikko was gone, it all seemed worth it.

The tenth installment of The Runaway. To read the rest, go ==> HERE. As always, I appreciate you taking the time to read my words. Peace...

Happy Dancing x 3

Three reasons why I'm jittering for joy. In order of importance:

ONE: My friend Michelle came through her surgery for cancer in stupendous shape. She believes in power of prayer, and so do I. So if you have a spare prayer, please send it her way. Think: good lymph nodes.

TWO: I found this nifty pencil holder at a weekend yard-sale. The drawings all around the cube remind me of my character Jeremiah and his South Dakota farm. It makes me smile, well worth the 50 cent investment.

THREE: And now I can purchase 100 pencil holders! A nice check for a 4-line poem. Look for Greetings From Motel 6 in the 2013 POET'S MARKET, coming soon to a bookstore near you!

Hope you have reason to dance. Peace...

HO DAY INN (The Runaway--IX)

THEY ARRIVED IN BOSTON IN THE THICK OF DARK. Wind blustered around the corner of the terminal. Two policemen stood in the bus terminal, watching arrivals and departures. When one of the cops prodded a woman asleep on a bench and surrounded by voluminous bags, Josh knew they’d have to find a place to crash.

Nik stood in the center of the terminal silent, shivering every few seconds. He headed for the bathroom as soon as they disembarked, and this time Josh followed him in. They both pissed, splashed their faces with water, and left the small reeking room. Outside, Nik pointed down the street with the brightest lights.

“There’s a Y down here,” he said. “On Boylston.”

But the Y was booked. The young clerk behind the counter suggested the Holiday Inn four blocks down.

They returned to the street. Overhead streetlamps flickered with each gust of wind. They almost missed the motel. The ‘L’ and ‘I’ parts of the sign had blinked out, so it read Ho day Inn. The lobby looked like any other Holiday Inn lobby: stark, efficient, too bright with incandescent lights, fake ficus trees in pots. Three men sat in green vinyl chairs drinking from small brown bags. The boys paid cash for the cheapest available room, a queen bed for $119.

The sixth floor room overlooked an exit ramp from the elevated highway. Trucks barreled down the elevated highway, their wheels hitting some bump or metal plate, the carumph echoing up. Nik threw his backpack on a chair and wandered into the bathroom.

“Lousy view, lousy amenities,” he said. “Thin towels you can see through.”

He rifled through the drawers, then picked up the phone.

“Can we please have a room service menu?”

Josh heard a muffled laugh from the other end of the phone. Nik slammed the phone into the receiver.

“What a dump. What a goddamn dump. No restaurant, just coffee and donuts in the morning. I am fucking starving!”

“We passed a vending machine,” Josh offered.

He dug in his jeans pocket and came up with a handful of change. Nik propped open the door with the phone book and together they walked down the hall, bringing the small plastic bucket for ice. Josh was parched, thirsty more than hungry.

The coins jangled in the machine. Nik pressed P2 and a bag of pizza-flavored Doritos tumbled into the chute. Ice clinked into the bucket.

Back in the room, Josh drank glass after glass of icy water. Nik crunched through the bag of chips, then pulled off his shoes, his shirt, and clambered into the queen size bed. Josh went to the bathroom, needing to release all the water he had drunk. When he came back, Nik was snoring.

He clicked off the lamp. The sheet felt cool against his bare legs and chest, and he shivered, but not from cold. He thought about tomorrow, about the possibilities. He thought about performing on corners to large crowds, the jingle of coins in his guitar case, of someone in the audience hearing him and appreciating his talent. It would all be worth it, he thought.

Light from the city glowed through the window, a gray haze obscuring clouds and stars and moon. The roar of the highway lulled him, the steady carumph-carumph of the trucks like a metronome. He woke up only once. A block of white light entered the room, the click of the door, and he sensed Nik leaving the room. He looked at the clock—2:13—but was so tired he did not care, he could not rise from the bed to check. In the morning, the sun blazed into the room, and Nik was still gone.

***
This week's installment of THE RUNAWAY, a story from THE MINISTER'S WIFE, currently under construction. Finished the entire story a few days ago, this baby clocks in at >13,000 words. Revision heaven awaits! If you wish to read the prior installments, please go HERE and follow the breadcrumbs back to ground zero.

As always, thank you for reading--this is all for you. Peace...

5 Reads / 5 Days

1. THE MEADOW by James Galvin. A gorgeous piece, an extended essay/poem on generationa growing up on a meadow perched on the Colorado-Wyoming border. Sounds dull. All the excerpts sound dull. But this small gem made me weep and laugh and smile and wish.

2. 40,000 WORDS. In my capacity as editor/classmate. I have visited Nigeria, a dreaming room, a small California coastal town, Sicily, among many other places, and met terrorists, mothers, a woman mourning her lost love, boys coming of age, among others. Wonderful. Of these 8 works, 3 began with a dream or waking up. Not so wonderful.

3. MAPS. Lots of maps. Maps of Delaware, South Dakota, Washington DC, and Boston, MA. Some for practical reasons (how the hell do we detour around Rehoboth Beach?) and others for their capacity to build place, to create setting.

4. HOW TO SAY GOODBYE by  James Valvis. Finally some hammock time to absorb these potent poems that twist and turn in unexpected, glorious ways, leaving my always with a gasp.

5. WITH MY BODY by Nikki Gemmell. Total summer read, a modernized version of The Story of 'O' and Lolita all mashed up. Written in second person POV, this one grows on you, makes you remember the heat of desire.

So... it's summer. Whatchya reading?

Peace...

TERMINAL (The Runaway--VIII)

BY THE TIME THE BUS REACHED THE NEW JERSEY TURNPIKE, Josh realized Nikko had problems deeper than he ever imagined. Nikko kept shivering, short, fast bursts of trembling that would rock Josh awake, then fell back into deep sleep, even though heat blasted through the bus. While Nik shivered and slept, Josh watched the red taillights of cars slide by and worried about his friend, worried the police would pull over the bus, for by now surely Gemma had cracked and the parents knew their plan.

They had ditched the car in the bowels of the Union Station parking lot, hoping to fake their parents into thinking they’d taken a train north. Instead, they’d blown fifty bucks on a cab, backtracking to Druid Hill to see Vee’s brother David. Nik’s idea, and not part of the plan. The cab parked in front of a row house whose second-floor windows were shot out. Across the parkway, the reservoir glittered blue.

“Dropping off something for Vee,” Nikko said. “Back in a jif.”

The cabbie grunted. He auto-locked the doors with a loud click and kept the engine idling. Josh kept his eyes glued on the barred door Nik had disappeared into. After a few minutes, Nik emerged, half-walking, half-skipping to the cab, carrying something small in his hand that he stuffed in his back jeans pocket. The cab fled south down the Fallsway, then followed Presidential Street as it twisted through Fells Point and Canton, past industrial-looking warehouses butting up against the murky harbor, until it pulled up a drive in a part of town Josh didn’t know existed.

They unloaded their backpacks and guitar. Somewhere, a highway hummed, the high whir persistent, like a mosquito. A couple of snow-flakes drifted from the grey sky. After Nikko, pad the cabbie, they hurried inside.

The cheapest bus left at five. Nikko said he had to use the can, so Josh piled their packs into a booth. Fluorescent light burned overhead, making the orange tables glow. A row of vending machines took up the wall space between the two bathroom entrances; lockers took up another wall. Most everyone who walked through the waiting room looked pasty and worn. A woman leaned against the glass window near the terminal door in impossibly high sequin heels, a hot pink skirt stretched tight across her thighs. She stared at him, licked her pink-stained lips, and he turned away. He pulled out his guitar, strummed a few lines of Blackbird, and even though he played quietly the music seemed too loud for this place, so he placed the guitar back in the case.

When twenty minutes had passed and Nikko still had not returned, Josh started to worry. He walked over to the men’s room, propped open the door, and whispered, “Nikko. You in there?” all while keeping an eye on their stuff in the booth. No one answered. A man came out as Josh spoke again, louder.

“There’s no one in there,” the man said.

The fluttery feeling in his stomach grew. He returned to the booth, hugging his guitar under his arm. He was about to pull out his phone and call his parents when the glass door opened and Nikko came in from outside. His shoulders slumped, as if very tired, but he smiled.

“Where the hell have you been?” Josh asked.

“Outside. Air,” Nikko said. “I waved when I came outta the john.”

“No you didn't," Josh said, and wondered why his friend’s words slurred.

“You must not have sheen me.”

Nikko slid into the booth across from him. His brown eyes looked black, huge glowing coals that filled his pale face, and he smiled this weird smile, like he couldn’t help himself. They sat there at the chipped Formica table, not talking. Their bus number was called over the PA.

“Go.” Nikko waved his hand. “Go piss.” He closed his eyes, leaned against the back of the booth, still smiling.

Half-way to Boston, Josh could not sleep. His stomach churned, from hunger, from nerves, from the growing certainty his best friend was sick. He placed his hand on Nik’s forehead, but the skin felt cool, damp. Nikko stirred, moaning, no longer smiling.


***

The 8th installment of THE RUNAWAY. Funny, but I suspect my story starts here. If you wish to read all the earlier throat-clearing, scroll down to the blog post below and follow the bread crumbs. As always, I appreciate you reading my words. Peace...

Teen Spirit (The RUNAWAY--VII)

LEAVING WAS EASIER THAN JOSH THOUGHT IT WOULD BE. Sunday morning, when he woke, for the first time all week his stomach did not hurt. After the service, voices melded into a thin hum. People drank coffee in partisan clumps, looking at watches, waiting. Josh told his parents he was walking over to the Pizza Palace to wait for a friend to pick him up for play rehearsal.

“What time do I need to pick you up?” his mom asked. She kept her eyes on his father, snuffing out the candles at the altar.

“I’ll get a ride back,” he said. “I’ll be late.”

“How late?”

“Maybe ten. It’s dress rehearsal.”

She nodded and deposited her cup on the table. No one noticed him leave with Nikko and Gemma. The three walked out together. Carrie sat on the bench, smoking.

“You really should stop smoking,” Nikko said. “It could kill you, you know.”

Carrie glared at him. “And you should stop talking to grown-ups like the punk you are.”

“Right.” Nikko laughed. She stubbed out her cigarette against the poured concrete floor and huffed into the building. They were half-way down the sidewalk when Nikko stopped and held up his right hand.

“Wait,” he said. “Eine moment.”

He turned and jogged back to the building.

“Bet he’s got to pee. Again.” Gemma pulled out her cell phone. “Vee,” she said and turned her back.

The sun reflected off the sidewalk, making Josh sweat. His stomach gurgled, then cramped, and he was sure he was going to shit his pants, so he headed back to the church, to go to the bathroom, when Nik came running out of the door.

“Booya!” His held his right hand in the air, green spilling out.

Gemma looked up from the phone. “Where did you get money?”

Nik grabbed Josh by the elbow. “Come on, let’s go!”

“Did you hit mom up for money?”

Gemma ran behind them. The car doors slammed behind them. The engine roared. Sounds Like Teen Spirit screamed from the speakers. Nik pulled out of the parking lot in a cloud of dust. Tears streamed down his cheeks, his head bobbing from laughter.

“Hell no, I didn’t ask Mama J for coinage,” he said. “I went to go piss and there it was, just waiting for some punk. As Carrie herself would say.”

“What was waiting?” Josh asked.

“The freaking collection basket! Just sitting there, on the shelf by the door to the bathroom. Seventy-six bucks. I left three quarters.”

“But that’s stealing!” Josh said.

“Stealing, Schmeeling. We are O-fish-ill-ee on the streets, as of now. Survival of the fittest, you know. Darwin’s theory put into practice.”

Nikko pressed on the gas. The car sped towards Baltimore, towards Penn station. A mile from the exit that would take them back home, Gemma leaned forward from the backseat and tapped her brother on the shoulder.

“Get off here,” she said.

“No way, we don’t have time.”

“I mean it, Nik.”

“You’re wussing out on us?”

“I don’t want to survive if it means stealing,” she said. “That’s just wrong.”

“If we stop I’m gonna have to duct tape you to a chair,” Nikko said.

“I won’t tell anyone you’ve left,” she said. “Promise.”

Nik wrenched the steering wheel a hard left and the car glided off the exit. At the intersection, Gemma opened the door. Her long brown legs slid over the vinyl seat. She leaned in the open window, held out her hand. Nikko tapped his fingers against hers. Her hand floated before Josh’s face, and he grabbed it, kissed the inside of her palm, smelling of chocolate from the cookie she had eaten at coffee hour, and he heard her laugh, but the laugh sounded sad.

“Good luck you guys,” she said. "Be safe."

She shouldered her bag and walked away. The car behind them honked. Nikko pulled out of the intersection. Josh turned around and Gemma waved. She got smaller and smaller. Panic filled Josh’s gut. They were doing it. They were really running away.

The saga continues. To catch up, read the last installment HERE and work backwards. Thank you for reading, and peace...

On the Corner

Fifteen seconds.

Waiting for the light to flip.

Cars fly twenty over, a hospital zone. A lanky young man, pants hanging low hips like a magic trick, bops to his silent music, fingers clacking, knees bending.

"X-rated, x-rated," another man, this one silver templed, peddles boosted nips of high-octane booze.

Across the street, a woman wavers. Already you can fry sunny-side ups on asphalt. She crumples, implodes inward slow-mo.

Cars stop. The white walking man says walk.

I cross. A half-dozen attend the fallen woman. The pusher makes a sale, and the bopping dude vaults through the cross-walk, a gazelle on speed.

Fifteen seconds on my way to work.

Peace...