NOT AN AMERICAN

by Stanley W Rogouski

  "My brother's homeless days are over. He can stay here as long as he wants. And don't feel guilty. You saved his life. I've taught myself to ignore Demosthenes. I never would have heard him barking outside."

  "We're going to look for your hat," Sherrod said to Avellanos before he closed the door. "Get well my friend. Get well."

  Over the next month, John Avellanos fell gravely ill. The morning after his arrival, he seemed fine. Felton, who went into her office early, had called up her friend Susan to check up on her "guest." Susan, an elderly woman who worked part time at the free clinic next door at the Presbyterian Church, reported that while the "guest" had quite obviously gotten the worse of a fist fight, he seemed otherwise to be in good health. He walked downstairs to eat breakfast, and even went outside to explore the old cemetery. He was chatty, and in high spirits. Later that evening, however, when Felton came back home, Avellanos suffered a breakdown. At first, he seemed happy to see his other cousin, even if he was a little confused at how kept referring to him as "Martin." He understood why when she picked a wallet up off the desk and walked over to the bed.

  "I'm sorry we couldn't find your hat," she said, flipping it open to the Veterans Identification Card. "I'm sure it had a lot of sentimental value."

  She laughed.

  "I spent the whole day wondering how in the world you talked a military photographer into letting you leave that hat on," she said. "Then I remembered who your father was. He could talk anybody into just about anything."

  Avellanos took the wallet in his hand, dumped the contents out onto the bed in front of him, and started looking for any sign of where Ruiz might have gone. Did he leave a note? The stub of a bus ticket? A WillyMart receipt for some warm weather clothes? But as Elizabeth Felton continued to laugh and fondly reminisce about her father, all of the spiritual energy drained out of Avellanos like air escaping from a balloon with a slow leak. Ruiz would not have slipped him the wallet, given him his ID and his identity, had he left town. There was only one reasonable conclusion. Ruiz had committed suicide. He had gone back up to West Hill and thrown himself into the mine fire. What's more, now he had to decide about whether or not he wanted to deceive his cousin Elizabeth, who had taken a complete stranger into her home the day after her father died without even a moment's hesitation, about his real identity. It was all too much, even for a young, physically strong man in his 20s.

  That night John Avellanos came down with one of the worst cases of the flu Elizabeth Felton had ever seen. He had to be quarantined. Only Susan went in and out of his room, and only for short periods of time. For a few days, Felton seemed to think his life in danger, remarking that the flu he suffered from reminded her of descriptions she had read about the Influenza Epidemic of 1918. By mid-December, even though he had recovered from the flu, he had lost almost 25 pounds. Then, just as everybody thought he was recovering, he was diagnosed with the chickenpox, which could be dangerous, even for a healthy young adult, but doubly menacing to a man who had come so close to dying of the flu only the month before. It was early-January and the dead of winter before he was well enough to go outside. He weighed a little over 150 pounds and his naturally olive complexion had faded to the point where he looked like an actor in a silent movie. Susan would help him up out of his bed as though he had been a frail old man and take him for walks around the cemetery and the church grounds. He would stare up at the Felton Mansion, almost as if it were a haunted house.

  Elizabeth Felton, who, during her cousin's long recovery had familiarized herself with Martin James Ruiz's military service and years of semi-homeless wandering, had chalked up the extended illness to a personality that had not fully reintegrated itself into civilian life. Coming to Poison Springs at long last to visit his biological father and then discovering that he was already dead had drastically weakened his already fragile immune system. But since he was young, only 30 years old, and strong, he would almost certainly get better, at least physically.

  By early March, she already saw signs, not only of his recovery, but also of his rejuvenation. Although he did spend most of the day by himself, avoiding contact not only with her and Susan, but with all of the young volunteers coming into town to work on her campaign, which was beginning in earnest, there were times when it was almost difficult to believe that he was either 30 years old or a veteran of the war in Iraq. He seemed like a mere boy, like a youth barely out of college, not a fully mature adult so beaten up by experience that it had wrecked his health. She felt more like a mother than an older sister. Then there was the scarf, for which he seemed to have some sort of obsession, spending hours with it pressed to his face, occasionally, out of the blue, throwing it to the ground in disgust. She decided, on the first warm day of spring, to ask him about it. He was in the cemetery, near her father's tombstone, the scarf dangling from his left hand, when he reached over, picked a handful of violets, put them in the scarf, and pressed it to his face.

  “I felt bad I couldn't find your hat," she said, coming up alongside him, "but I guess it's been replaced by that scarf. Does it have some kind of emotional significance?"

  "This scarf?" he said, holding it up, initially startled but pausing and thinking in earnest. "Yes, it does, but it would be hard to explain without sounding like a fool."

  Avellanos looked up at the trees, just beginning to acquire leaves, and realized that, like Rip Van Winkle, he had slept through the entire harsh winter. He looked around at the rich, well-kept suburban houses, the neatly trimmed garden at the end of the cemetery, and the whitewashed 19th century church and tried to remember that terrifying night the previous November in the parking-lot at WillyMart, the thunder snow, the sound of Andy's arm breaking, and the girl who had given him the scarf. He looked down off the bluff at downtown Poison Springs, the modest little skyline glistening in the morning light coming over the bluff from the east and imagined for a moment that he was dead, that he was a disembodied spirit, and that the city was the mortal earth below.

  "I apologize," she said. "It's none of my business."

  "Are you familiar with the 37th Book of Genesis?" he said.

  "37th Book of Genesis?"

  "It's the book where Joseph is looking for his brothers."

  "Of course. It's one of the most famous stories in the Bible"

  "I'm not interested in the whole story, just that one chapter."

  "What do you mean?"

  "Joseph's father sends him out to look for his brothers. He gets lost, and a certain man found him, and, behold, he was wandering in the field: and the man asked him, saying, What seekest thou? And he said, I seek my brethren: tell me, I pray thee, where they feed their flocks. And the man said, They are departed hence; for I heard them say, Let us go to Dothan. And Joseph went after his brethren, and found them in Dothan."

  Elizabeth Felton laughed.

  "And then his brothers sold him into slavery."

  "It has a happy ending. Joseph goes to Egypt and becomes an adviser to the Pharaoh. That puts him in a position where he can save his whole family.”

  "It's very impressive that you've memorized the Bible like that. I guess you had a lot of time to read the Bible when you were in the military."

  Avellanos held up the scarf.

  "At key points in the Old Testament," he said, "an angel appears in human form. Notice how Joseph doesn't ask the man for directions. He asks Joseph. That nondescript little man was an angel. So was the person who gave me this scarf. She saw me staring at your campaign poster tacked up to the bus shelter at WillyMart, and gave me directions here. She was fate appearing at a key moment. Without her I would have died. I was planning to spend the night at the train station. Had I done so, the police would have kicked me out, and I would have frozen to death. I had no idea how sick I was. But she told me to come here. And here I am, alive, waiting to begin the next phase of my life."

  Felton raised her eyebrow at the mention of a woman at the bus stop, remembering his fevered ramblings from the night of the bl
izzard.

  "I don't think you should just wait for the next phase of your life to begin. You should just begin it."

  Avellanos stared at the ground as if he realized how ridiculous he sounded. He looked back up, smiled sheepishly, and started laughing.

  “I doubt I'll ever see her again," he said, looking off the bluff at downtown Poison Springs in the distance. "I guess it shows you what having a fever can do to your imagination," he continued, looking back at Elizabeth Felton. "I picked this scarf up off the bench, and wiped my face. She materialized out of the blizzard, saw me staring at your campaign poster, pointed up to the white steeple on the bluff above the city, and disappeared back into the snow. She's probably not even real. She was too beautiful to have been real anyway. I guess I'm just in love with my own imagination."

  Elizabeth Felton examined her cousin, still thinking that he was her illegitimate, half-brother, still unnerved by his resemblance to her late father. To Elizabeth Felton, John Avellanos not only looked like her father come back to life. He looked like her father come back to life in the prime of his youth. He also had an appealing softness. He was tall, broad shouldered, and rugged looking just like her father, but his body language was deferential, almost feminine, odd, she thought, considering how he had served three tours of duty in Iraq, but appealing nonetheless. His manner of speaking fascinated her. While at times he sounded almost like a native of Poison Springs, like her father as a young man, at other times his voice had a halting elegance, almost as if English had not been his first language.

  "Whether or not she was real, she did point you in the right direction."

  "What do you mean?"

  "She saw you looking at my poster and assumed you were coming here to volunteer on my campaign. Why don't you? I could even give you a salary."

  Avellanos looked almost distressed.

  "What could I possibly have to offer?"

  "I'm not going to put you in front of the cameras or make you my speech writer. I need someone who can help around the office, and maybe support some of my volunteers while they're making phone calls. It would be a great opportunity to meet people."

  He sighed.

  "You don't really know me."

  "You're my brother."

  "You don't know my history or who I really am. I have a dark past, a very dark past. I shouldn't even be here. When Michael Catalinelli finds out, he's going to tar you with everything I've ever done."

  "He already knows you're here. He spoke at our father's memorial service. His press secretary found you out in the snow. I'm sure he's told his boss. Anything and everybody connected to me is already public information. You have absolutely nothing to gain, either for you or for me, by hiding yourself. In fact, when my campaign starts in earnest, they're going to try to play me as an out of touch, over educated liberal elitist who hates America. You're an Iraq war vet who can quote the Bible from memory. You're like a gift from God."

  "You may live to regret those words."

  "So does that mean your answer is yes?"

  "Can I think about it for a few days?"

  "Come up to my office later if you want to talk about it."

  "I'll come up tomorrow. I want to sleep on it."

  "Take as much time as you want. Things won't get busy for a month or two anyway."

  John Avellanos watched his cousin walk back through the cemetery up onto the. He wanted to accept her offer of employment, but he knew he could not. Martin James Ruiz had been a rough, harsh, violent man, but he was also a man of honor. To steal his identity would be to erase his memory. It would be to turn a lie that came out of desperation into a lie pure and simple. The next morning, he woke up at eight in the morning, showered, dressed in his best clothes, a cheap pair of jeans and a t-shirt from WillyMart, and put the waterproof plastic envelope under his arm. He walked upstairs, intending to show his cousin the photo of his mother as a middle aged woman, and the old newspaper article. He knocked on the door, and walked inside. Elizabeth Felton's office was a modest little suite of rooms on the third floor, but Avellanos knew that at least part of it had once been his mother's bedroom. The windows looked out over the trees in the cemetery onto the Winterborn Valley below.

  "Good morning," she said, looking up from her desk.

  "Good morning."

  "Have you explored our father's old bedroom yet," she said, looking at his faded T-shirt. "He has some really nice clothes, Brooks Brothers, LL Bean, some locally tailored suits."

  Avellanos looked down at his clothes, embarrassed.

  "They'll fit you perfectly. Try them on. Tell me what you think. I was going to give them all away, but why not pass them down to the next generation?"

  "This is quite a view you have," Avellanos said, walking over to one of the windows and looking out at City Hall and the West Hill Coal Breaker in the distance.

  "If I win the election this fall," the view won't be as good. "I'll have to spend most of the day in Michael's old office at City Hall."

  "That's near that big park downtown, right?"

  "You really are new in town, aren't you? That Park is Poison Springs. I think there's a guidebook over there on the bookshelf if you're interested."

  John Avellanos turned around. He almost collapsed in shock. On the wall opposite his cousin's desk were two paintings, one of his uncle Nicholas Felton, and another of his mother Laura Felton, two large portraits done up in the style of James McNeill Whistler by a local artist decades before, unfashionable even then, but striking and magnetic nonetheless. Avellanos turned away from the painting of his uncle to look at the painting of his mother. It had the stark, spare quality of a black and white photograph. He recognized himself almost immediately in her image.

  "I'm sure you can see the resemblance."

  "Yes I can."

  "He was 26 in that painting, just about your age."

  Avellanos laughed nervously.

  "I wasn't thinking of the painting on the left. I was thinking of the painting on the right."

  "That's your aunt Laura."

  "That artist had an incredible eye for detail," Avellanos said, moving towards his mother's portrait. "He even adds a hint of premature gray hair, and she was what? 18?"

  “The painter is still alive. But he's in his 90s and he's got Alzheimer's so I don't think he could tell you very much about why he added that little touch of gray so many years ago."

  "Laura Felton was a member of the Weather Underground, wasn't she?"

  "She wasn't a member of the Weather Underground, but close. I apologize for not warning you about the painting. I'm sorry."

  "Why would you be sorry?"

  "You're an Iraq war vet."

  Avellanos shrugged.

  "I actually think I look more like Laura Felton than Nicholas Felton.," he said. "I could be her son. Don't you think?"

  "That painting has that effect on people. It draws people in. It captures their souls."

  "It's a beautiful image."

  "It's a work of art that glamorizes evil."

  "I wouldn't call her evil."

  "What would you call using violence to get your way in a democracy?"

  "What if neither party represents your real interests? Both parties back then supported the war."

  "Nonviolent protest," she said, "mass, non-violent protests, or a lot of small, creative protests, as long as they're non-violent."

  "What if the people won't listen to you?"

  "Then all violence accomplishes is replacing one dictator with another."

  She looked up at the painting.

  "That woman has the face of a tyrant. She wanted to command not lead."

  "What's the difference?"

  "That woman had glamour. A democratic leader does not have glamour."

  "What do you mean?"

  "A democratic leader does a lot of hard work in seemingly insignificant little ways. He doesn't expect to see immediate results, or any results. He just does what his conscience tells him. A dictator l
ikes grand, self-aggrandizing, ultimately empty gestures, glamour, and style. That's what your aunt wanted, to go down in history as a beautiful martyr, not to stop the war in Vietnam. Our father had the same, dreadful impulses, but he managed to divert them into something harmless, like womanizing."

  Avellanos frowned.

  "I don't know about that."

  Elizabeth Felton pursed her lips and widened her eyes, looking determined, but contrite.

  "I realize what our father did hurt you personally more than what your aunt did. But think about it this way. She grew up in privilege and she turned into a terrorist. You grew up abandoned by your father and you went to Iraq to serve your country."

  "People make such a big fuss about that. I wish they wouldn't."

  "I was against the war, but what you did is a sign of character. Do you see how modest you are? You don't even want to talk about it. The fact that you can forgive your aunt after you served your country and she betrayed her country says that in addition to being a patriot you have a generous soul."

  "I've never served anybody's country."

  He unzipped the waterproof plastic envelope, but quickly put it back under his arm.

  "I wanted to ask you if I could take another day to decide."

  Elizabeth Felton sighed, obviously disappointed.

  “You really did serve your country by going to Iraq," she said, "not because the war was justified, but because you demonstrated that there are people in the United States willing to put their own bodies on the line for someone else's mistakes. I know you've been a lost soul for the past four or five years, and now that I've seen your reaction to your aunt's portrait, I'm beginning to understand why. You didn't believe in that war you fought in. You hated it. But this election is a war you can believe in. Michael Catalinelli is everything rotten about this country. If we can beat him here we can beat him anywhere. I'm appealing to the patriotism inside you that our government betrayed when they sent you to Iraq. Your country needs you."

  Avellanos smiled nervously.

  "I'm sorry," she said. "I get carried away sometimes."

  "It's not that," he said.