Hey, I said. What are you doing out here?
My car, she said. I ran off the road.
Get out of the street, my uncle said. Power line’s down.
She was tall and thin. The same age as my mother when she died. Her hair was brown and long, the way some country girls still keep it.
I was working the late shift, she said. Couldn’t get home before the storm.
Let’s get inside, my uncle said. We’ll call someone.
She came inside and my aunt got her a towel and something warm from the laundry room. One of my flannel shirts. Two sizes too big. She called a friend to pick her up, but the roads were closed. They were going to be a little while.
Have a beer while you wait, my uncle said. Gotta drink them or they’ll get hot.
She doesn’t want a beer, my aunt said.
No, the woman said. I’ll drink one.
My name’s Maggie, she said.
I’m Joe, I said. Friends call me Cloud.
We played cards all night under candlelight, Maggie was on my team. We won every time. My aunt and uncle got drunk and started telling stories on each other. It was the first time I’d ever felt close to them. Mostly we watched TV in silence, but that night I felt like a family. At one point my uncle was bringing back beers from the kitchen and had an extra. He slid it my way.
It’s time, he said.
Really, I said.
Yeah, he said. You’ve earned it.
He’s too young, my aunt said.
He deserves it, Maggie said. He saved me.
The beer tasted awful but I drank every drop. I wanted to impress this stranger. We played more games: go fish, poker, gin. It was almost 3:00 a.m. before the lights were back on. The stereo came alive full blast playing Sly and the Family Stone. We all jumped up. Started dancing we were so excited. Maggie took me by the hands and I dipped her as I’d seen in movies. Everyone thought that was so funny. This kid and this woman, dancing. They laughed and laughed. Then it was time for her to go.
The last thing I remember was what Maggie said at the end of the night. Her ride was there and she was saying thank you to my aunt and uncle. She tried to give my flannel back but I said she could keep it.
You’ve raised such a fine boy, she said.
I was tipsy. I didn’t want her to go.
They’re not my parents, I said. My parents are dead.
My aunt and uncle looked at each other. Maggie’s ride honked outside. She walked over to me and kissed me on the forehead.
You’re one of the good ones, she whispered.
I swear it was the voice of my mother.
I read somewhere that the earth only has a couple of good years left. Soon it’ll be too hot to live. I assume I’ll end before the world does, my mind already fading toward oblivion. Some days are better than others but when things are bad I’m like a child that believes if they close their eyes the world will disappear. I’ll be dust soon and they’ll put a gravestone over me and in time that too will turn to dust and nothing will exist. Before that happens I wanted to put down in writing some things that I’ve loved and remind you that, for now, I persist. My little dog is scared of thunder. I drink tea and read the paper in the evening. When I put tulips in the window, they open toward the sun. Someone in the distance is calling my name.
A NOTE ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Michael Bible is the author of Sophia and Empire of Light.
Originally from North Carolina, he lives in New York City.
ALSO AVAILABLE FROM MICHAEL BIBLE
“Bible roots out the sublime pleasures available at the searing edge of depressed feeling. Denis Johnson seems to be the abiding spirit of the novel, which achieves the incendiary strangeness of his prose…Bible offers us a remarkable vision of adolescence as not just a time of extreme exposure but one of visionary longing.”
—The New York Times
“A shorthand masterpiece of style, a tour de force of voice.”
—Tom Franklin, author of Crooked Letter, Crooked Letter
“Empire of Light is a truly beautiful book.”
—William Boyle, author of Gravesend
“A euphoric, one-of-a-kind novel.”
—Arkansas International
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