So I picked up the phone and called Glory. My call went straight to her voicemail—she probably wasn’t up yet. It was only seven a.m. I left what I will admit was a terse message. I just simply said I was feeling too ill. I don’t even think I said goodbye.
I turned off my cell phone—my headache was so horrific that I didn’t even want to feel the blasted thing vibrating.
I then heard a racket from my neighbor’s house across the street. He was thwacking the weeds in his yard. The incessant whine and chop of the whacker’s motor was more than I could bear. Besides, there was an unspoken rule in the neighborhood: No yard work with motor tools until ten a.m.
I decided I was going to go out there and set my neighbor straight.
His last name was Gellman. I didn’t know what his first name was and I never wanted to know it. He was a few years my senior and bigger around the middle than a wild boar. The Domino’s delivery guy should have just moved in with Gellman, because Gellman ordered from there six nights a week. When I moved into the neighborhood ten years ago he’d sported a blond crew cut. Now his crew cut was completely gray, and he somehow managed to maintain a scruffy beard that always looked like it was just three days old. I had never seen Gellman with a woman. In fact, aside from the pizza man, I had never seen him with anyone at all.
“Well, well, well. Look at what the proverbial cat dragged out,” Gellman crowed as I approached him. He had this ultra-smug look on his face that said he’d just as soon crap on you than to look at you. Worse was his hideous gap-toothed rictus that had always spooked the total living shit out of me. He made Chucky Doll look like Shirley-fucking-Temple. Through the years we’d had many disputes about his barking dogs—the son of a bitch had five of them. Thankfully the noisiest of the lot had recently died. I mean, I wasn’t glad the little yapper was dead, but I was grateful it wasn’t around to torture me anymore. I’d had nothing to do with the dog’s fatal end, but I think Gellman still suspected foul play on my part.
I halted my advance just beyond arm’s reach of him. While still holding his weed eater he lifted his left leg and ripped a hair-parting fart. He then shouted: “Oh no! Where’d it go?” It was always the same old gag with him. The guy could fart at will. I’m not kidding.
“How’re things, Gonzo?” I said. I always called him Gonzo. The first time I’d called him Gonzo he had taken it with surprisingly good cheer, somehow believing the nickname was born out of genuine affection, which it of course was not. But he had enthusiastically encouraged other neighbors to also call him Gonzo. I called him Gonzo because it sounded like a good name for a malevolent clown. And that’s what he was: a spooky goddamned clown.
“Well,” he said, stroking his stubbly whiskers, “I’m not doing as well as I used to be, up until a couple of weeks ago anyway. Where’s that fine woman of yours that I used to always see you with? Caitlin, was it?” I nodded. “Yeah, I miss seeing that tight, sweet caboose of hers. Damn, I just love those little Irish-blooded spitfires. She’d look better with red hair, though.” His face then contorted into a disgusting visage that was all too familiar to me. He held up a finger and said, “Incoming,” and then he farted again. I had to hand it to him: that one was a champion-caliber cheek flapper.
A few seconds later I caught a toxic whiff of his gastric masterpiece. “Christ, Gonzo,” I said. I just left it at that. I didn’t want to encourage him further.
“Well, you really do look like death warmed over,” he remarked. “You’re trying to emulate me, I see, by sprouting some stubble of your own.”
“It’s only seven o’clock, Gonzo. I’ll shave before the sun clears the horizon.”
“Honestly, Smitty, I can’t recall ever seeing you up as early as I have of late. What’s up with you? You look like you got in a fight with an eighteen-wheeler.”
“Do you know what time it is?” I asked him.
“Ah yes, it is indeed a beautiful, beautiful morning.” He pointed to the still-rising sun. “I know you just hate a beautiful morning, don’t you? You always hide from God’s grandeur.” Gellman had a bit of the Holy Roller in him.
“You seem to have forgotten the ten o’clock rule on yard tools,” I said. I knew I had him over the barrel now. “So I am kindly asking you to withdraw your power tools until the designated time.”
He scratched his stubble, which made an annoying sandpapery noise, and then he smiled. “That’s only on the weekends, mi amigo. The ten o’clock rule does not apply to workdays. Today is Thursday.”
He was quibbling, but I wasn’t going to let him off the hook so easily. “Perhaps we could take this matter up with the HOA,” I said, referring to the homeowners association. I don’t even know why I played that card, because I knew what everyone else in the neighborhood did. It was a weak homeowners association, with little power and no deed restrictions granting them any real authority. Hell, the dues were voluntary, and the money was only used to conduct quarterly meetings and to keep the common areas watered. That was it.
Gonzo set his weed eater on the ground and put his hand on my shoulder. “I’m worried about you. You’re out here on my front lawn wearing shorts that are too big for you, you have no shirt on, and you look like hammered dog shit. Besides, you’ve never been an early riser. My yard work has never bothered you before. I’ve been doing this on Thursday morning for years now. You never said a thing. What’s more, I noticed that your lights were on inside your house. You were up and about.” He removed his hand and shook his head. “Why all the anger, Smith? I’m trying to be a thoughtful neighbor.”
He was right. I was being an asshole just for the sake of being an asshole. I was being unreasonable. I was just looking for a fight. I realized just then that my whole life had been that way. I was a confrontational prick. It was like I was on a mission to burn every bridge in my life.
“I apologize,” I said softly. I turned and started to walk away.
“Smith,” he called out to me. “Stop for a sec.”
I turned and faced Gonzo, fully expecting him to launch yet another stink bomb.
“You’ve lost something very important to you,” he said. “Is that not true?”
“You don’t know what you’re talking about, Gonzo.”
He smiled in a surprisingly avuncular manner. I could have sworn that his teeth sparkled for just a split second. I really think they did.
“You’re freaking me out with that look, Gonzo. What are you thinking?”
“I’m going to do something for you,” he said. “I know you don’t believe too deeply in the power of the Lord, except perhaps during your more vulnerable and selfish moments.”
“Are you accusing me of dealing selfishly with God?”
He just kept smiling and continued: “I’ve now decided I am going to personally ask God for a miracle—a miracle for you, my good neighbor. Though you wished death upon my favorite dog, I am going to pray and ask that God return to you what it is you have lost. But God won’t just give it to you at my humble request alone.”
“What the hell are you talking about, Gonzo? Quit fucking with me.”
“You and I obviously have at least one heavenly experience in common,” he said. “The look of terminal fear in your eyes tells me all I need to know. You have the look of a man who has had something precious taken away from him, something so profoundly coveted that any man would kill to regain it. But sometimes it is that very fear itself that keeps you from returning to that special place.”
The dude was really freaking my ass out. There just wasn’t any way he was talking about what I thought he was. How’d he know about my special place?
“At the end of your journey you will return to that special place, that heavenly state of being, but only if you have truly conquered your fear and have come to peace with God. It will then be up to you to decide if you wish to remain there. And trust me on this: it will be a rather difficult decision for you to make, but make it you shall.”
I was about to ask him a questi
on, but he then held up his hands so his palms faced the heavens. To see it you’d have thought he was Moses. All he needed was a staff of wood and a rock to pound it on.
“Thou walkest away from here,” he commanded. “I love you, Brother Smith. God bless your weary soul on the perilous journey that you now face.”
He then returned to his weed eating and left me standing there with my mouth gaping wide open.
21
“YOU CAN’T GO DARK on me like that again, old man.”
Vernon Hammond was going easier on me than I’d thought he would. Since turning off my cell phone early Thursday morning, it hadn’t been until this Monday morning, four days later, that I’d powered it back on. Vernon was one of several people who’d been put off by my disappearing act. His place was the first stop along the path of my apology tour.
“I’m sorry, Vernon. I really am.” I felt like crying. I never liked disappointing that man. No one in the world had ever cared for me more than Vernon. He was the last person I needed to alienate. “But I’m just going to grow even more insane than I already am if I don’t get more than two hours of sleep at a time. And hell, even that is on a good night.”
Vernon knew most everything about me. In particular he knew I was a manic-depressive and that I had abused alcohol frequently, even long before the ten years since we had first met. Whenever I came to him with any kind of trouble, Vernon always seemed to have an answer.
“I don’t know if this’ll help you much,” Vernon said as he swiveled in his chair to face the laptop on his desk. We were in his study. He must have had at least fifty Buckwheat pencil trolls scattered about his desk, with an even dozen of them taped or glued to his laptop. “I’m sending you a link to some meditation recordings on the Web.” He clicked on his mouse to send the message and then swiveled around to face me again. “There are about twenty different types of meditations, some dealing with stress and anger management, some to relax the muscles and ease tension, and one or two to help lull you to sleep. They’re free, but very professionally done and quite effective, in my opinion.”
“It can’t hurt to try,” I said. “Thanks, Vernon.”
Vernon asked what I had been doing during my weekend of seclusion. I explained that my killer headache had not subsided until sometime Saturday morning. Though I still hadn’t slept much since then, not having the headache and nausea to contend with had made life a little more bearable. So I spent the rest of the weekend just learning to play my guitar.
I showed Vernon my hands. “Check out these blisters,” I said. “They should callus up in the next day or so. It’s from fretting on the left hand and from fingerpicking on the right. I played so much that they bled.”
“I admire your dedication,” he said, smiling. “I know that once you set your mind to accomplishing something, you’re a pretty resolute fellow. I’ll have to come over one night and watch you play. If you can even play rhythm just a little bit, I can hook you up with some friends of mine who’ll let you come over and jam with them. How about that?”
After we were done shooting the bull, Vernon asked if I was ready to get back to work.
“I don’t know,” I said. “I’ve been away from computers long enough to start wondering if it’s still a good field to work in anymore.”
“Why do you say that?” he asked. “Folks always have to use their computer. Maybe they cut back on hardware and services on occasion, but not for too long. It’s an important part of business, Smith. They ain’t going back to the abacus to get things done.”
“Yeah, but it doesn’t pay like it did ten years ago,” I said. “I remember guys who didn’t even have degrees that were making thirty to fifty an hour on temp assignments, double that or more if they contracted directly. With my degree I was pulling down even more. Now, though, computer guys are just like garbage collectors, except those guys make more money these days.”
“Are you interested in making a living again or not?” Vernon said impatiently. “It’s still a respected profession. You still have things in your head about computers that folks are willing to pay for. Quit feeling sorry for yourself. Are you in or are you out?”
“I’m in,” I said. Though I had been dead set against working with computers again, if Vernon said he had a way back in, I knew better than to doubt him. Besides, I was running out of money, and the prospect of foreclosure served as a strong motivator—I didn’t want to lose my home.
“All right,” he said. He slapped me on the back, stood from his chair, and then headed for the kitchen. “I got some leftover Chinese food in the fridge. I know you like the chicken fried rice. I’ll warm you up a bowl. You’ll need some food in your belly to help you think proper, because after you leave here you’re going on your first assignment.”
…
“I want you to get yourself straight,” Vernon said later after he’d put down his fork. He dabbed the corners of his mouth with a napkin, wadded the napkin into a ball, and threw it at me. “You listening to me, old man?”
“Sorry,” I said. I was lost in space again. I just couldn’t hold my concentration, not even when I had to. “Vernon, if I can just get one night of sleep, maybe I can dial back in to reality.”
“I know you’re off your meds and all, but have you considered maybe talking to other bipolars, like in a group setting of some kind? Maybe talk to folks going through the same thing?”
I shook my head. “No way. There’s nothing worse than a room full of manic-depressives.”
“So you’ve been to such a group before?”
“Uh huh,” I said. “Back in college, when I was first diagnosed. I was only eighteen or nineteen. My doctor sent me to a support group that met weekly at a mental hospital. It was part of a national association of manic-depressives. The meeting took place in a bright white room full of plastic-backed chairs, and there were tables with coffee and doughnuts. They’d go around the room having everybody talk about their miserable lives. Man, I can remember thinking, ‘I’m not like these nuts.’ You’ve never seen so many hands violently shaking in your entire life, either. At least half a dozen people had their hands shaking so bad that their coffee was spilling from their cups. As much lithium as I was taking at the time, these folks took triple the amount I did, or even more. I wondered why they were drinking so much coffee with their hands quaking like that. And you’ve also never seen so many chain smokers in one room. Over half the participants had to leave the room every five minutes to go grab another smoke. And then the crying and the moaning. . . . Jesus. Never again will I go to one of those things. Never.”
Vernon remarked, “You’re not terribly sensitive to your own kind.”
“I know it sounds bad, Vernon. But the truth is, compared to most other bipolars, I have a rather mild case of it. My depression can get pretty bad, I’ll grant you that. But my manic phases have been few and far between, and they were a hell of a lot worse between my teen years and my mid-thirties. As far as manic-depressives go, I’m pretty lucky. But still, I just don’t like being around them. I know it sounds selfish, but I really like to suffer my demons alone.”
Vernon nodded. “Okay, you’ve always been a bit of the loner. I’d feel a whole lot better about you if you at least had a girlfriend who spent some time at your place. Now that you’ve lost Caitlin, I can’t help—”
“I’m fine,” I said. I took the last bite from my serving of fried rice and then washed it down with a gulp of water. And then I burped.
Vernon laughed. “Ah yes, you still do that after every time you eat Chinese? Hell, I’m just glad you still have your sense of humor intact.”
After we stacked our dishes in the sink we convened in the living room to talk business.
“Well, as I suspected would happen, your photograph from the brochures and website has garnered quite a bit of attention from the ladies,” Vernon said. “In fact, after I supplied some of those interested with your professional credentials—your degree, certifications, continuing educat
ion—it piqued their interest even more. So kid, you got the looks and you got the talent.”
“I never thought you could sell sex to score a computer gig.”
“I adore your naïveté, old man. You can use sex to sell anything. Why not computers as well?”
“Whatever,” I said. I was in serious mode now. “I’m ready to get back out there. Where’s my first stop?”
“Well, since you’ve been a little down of late, what with relationships gone bad and not sleeping, I have just the client to turn your sourpuss attitude around.”
“Okay,” I said. “Let’s rock.”
22
THOUGH THE SIGN ON the door led me to believe it was a water store, inside it looked more like a massage parlor. Located in a Dusty Pond strip mall, the store was about the same size as a typical discount hair salon. Professional massage chairs lined both sides of the store from front to rear, with eight on each side. A display easel extolling the virtues and benefits of alkaline water was placed next to the front counter. In the previous few weeks, in my outings with Sidebottom and Samantha, I had heard many enthusiastic testimonials about alkaline water. I’d also heard from an equal number of naysayers. Either way, I hadn’t paid much attention to all of the talk. What did impress me, though, was how aggressively it had been marketed to Dusty Pond regulars. There probably wasn’t anyone who didn’t know what alkaline water was.
I was about to find out why.
Vernon had instructed me to ask for Rachel Draper—she would be my contact on this assignment. One of the masseuses told me to wait at the counter and that Rachel would be out in a moment.
When she emerged from the door at the rear of the establishment, I recognized this complete knockout of a gal right away. Having seen her before, though, didn’t prevent my jaw from dropping more than just a little bit. I had previously admired this adorable creature for having not fallen prey to Sidebottom’s pickup antics. Indeed, even Sidebottom himself had been impressed by her savvy, saying she was obviously very well-read (he claimed intelligence had nothing to do with a woman’s potential immunity to pickup techniques—even a Rhodes Scholar could fall victim to his bag of tricks). Rachel Draper knew the playbook, and she wouldn’t tolerate any of those shenanigans being pulled in her presence for even a second.
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