Good People

by Robert Lopez

  She said she couldn’t because her week was bananas. I told her I like bananas. I said I cut them up and put them in my cereal in the morning. I don’t cut up a banana every morning, though, and I told her this. Sometimes I can’t find a ripe banana. Sometimes I go to five different stores and can’t find a single ripe banana. You’d think it was a conspiracy. You’d think all the grocers, supermarkets, and bodegas have it in for me. And I won’t buy green bananas. I won’t give them the satisfaction. Green bananas are like life insurance, to my way of thinking. I’ve always been shortsighted like this, can never see myself living long enough to enjoy a green banana or collect life insurance. I mean anyone’s life insurance, not mine, of course. I know that I can’t collect on my own life insurance. I don’t think I’m anyone’s beneficiary, either. Not even my father, if he’s still alive. He disowned me years ago, but I don’t blame him for that. He had better things to do than own someone who doesn’t have the foresight to buy a green banana. It’s not like I don’t know that green bananas turn yellow in time and in theory. It’s just that I can’t believe it actually happens to real people. I’m sure if I were to buy a green banana and bring it home, it’d stay green in perpetuity. I don’t know what this says about me except that maybe I’m shortsighted or am faithless, except I’m not sure it’s true that I’m faithless. I’m sure there’s something I believe in, and if you gave me a second, I could probably come up with a whole list. My father wouldn’t be listed if he’s still alive, although I doubt he is. I never saw him as the type that’d live a long time. I probably get that from him, if I get anything at all, other than the cutting up of bananas. If he’s dead, I’m sure he died standing up and talking back because that’s how I remember him. He wouldn’t take anything off anybody and that’s another thing I get from him. This is what I told her when she said her week was bananas and before she even had a chance to reply, I said, And you’d better believe it, sister.

  Goodnight Maybe Forever

  TODAY I WILL HANG MYSELF in the backyard. I’m neither proud nor ashamed of this. Every day I do something and this is what I have scheduled for today. Yesterday I ate a peach. I hadn’t had a peach in years, I don’t think, since I was a child. The night before I remembered that my mother would bring home peaches from the grocer whenever they were in season. So I put on my trousers, found a clean shirt buried under some newspapers, and walked to the grocer where I picked out the peach I thought looked best. I remembered to squeeze the peaches as I was trying to decide which one to purchase. I remembered that peaches could be too hard or soft and that neither was a good idea. My mother is the one who taught me how to pick out peaches this way. She said that someday she wouldn’t be around to take care of me and my brothers and sisters and someone needed to know how to pick out peaches. This never did happen, though. Mother was always around to take care of us and I think she still is today. What I mean is I think she is still around, not that she is still taking care of us. At this point she probably can’t even take care of herself. I imagine she’d have to be close to a hundred years old now. I haven’t seen nor heard from her in years. I tried not to think about my mother or who might be taking care of her as I was picking out my peach. There wasn’t anyone around when I was testing the peaches and for this I was grateful. I don’t like to see anyone touching the fruit and I’m sure they feel the same about me. The peach I eventually did pick out seemed to have the perfect texture and tone. I was both pleased and confident as I walked to the cashier. After paying for the peach I took it home so I could rinse it properly. My mother taught us how to rinse a peach under cold water. She said we should never rub a peach on our shirt because it would bruise. She said we could clean an apple that way, but not a peach. This didn’t matter to me because I never cared for apples. My mother would bring apples home from the grocer, but I refused to eat them. I told her I found apples to be disagreeable. This always upset my mother, whenever I said something like this. She said I didn’t make any sense, that I was an idiot like my father. I didn’t know what this meant exactly, if he didn’t care for apples, either. My mother was often upset and my brothers and sisters and I always had to be careful whenever she was around, which was all the time. Mother never left us unattended. She didn’t trust us. I don’t blame her. I didn’t trust us, either. I considered saving the peach for dinner but decided to eat it right after the rinsing. The first bite held great promise, as my teeth broke the skin and penetrated the inner fruit. As I started to chew, however, I realized that the peach looked better than it tasted. I tried another bite, thinking perhaps it might get better as I kept going. It didn’t. I felt cheated, as anyone might imagine. I felt as though I had let myself down, that I’d let my mother down, that I should’ve known better. I’m not saying this is the reason I’m going to hang myself in the backyard today, of course. I’ve been planning to hang myself for a while now. Countless others have done likewise and I’m no different, not by any measure.

  I have, over the years, been badly beaten. This is probably one of the reasons I’m as tired as I am now. I am almost always tired and I always want to go to bed and I always try to sleep the entire day away and I blame the people who have beaten me, among others. This is no way to go through life, no way to live one. I would tell people this if anyone cared to ask. If someone said to me, Is this any way to go through life? I would say, No, of course not. I would say, What the fuck is wrong with you, asking me a question like that? My mother used to ask me this all the time. She would stand with hands on hips, look me dead in the eye, and say, What the fuck is wrong with you? I would have to think about what was wrong with me and then answer. Sometimes I’d have to come up with a list and hand it over to her like it was homework. This always took a long time to do as there has always been a lot wrong with me. But no one asks me questions anymore, which is good because I don’t have answers, other than this one about life and how not to go through it. For instance, I don’t know why people like to beat me. I have tried to figure this out for years now. I’ve wondered if I ever did anything to provoke these beatings. If such was the case I could do something to prevent them. I could alter my behavior, avoid certain circumstances, certain crowds. To be fair, not everyone has beaten me, though certainly a great many have and many others have tried to do so. I am fleet afoot and can sometimes outrun those who mean to beat me. The trouble is I have no endurance. So, if someone who means to beat me has any endurance at all they can catch up to me in no time and then commence. I remember someone saying that once before I was beaten. They had me cornered, tied to a post, and someone said, You may commence. I haven’t always been beaten this way and I can’t remember the circumstances surrounding this particular beating. Often more than one person wants to beat me at the same time. I’m not sure why this is. It probably makes it easier on them, the division of labor. I imagine it’s taxing to beat someone all by yourself. I wouldn’t know this because I have never in my life beaten anyone, either on my own or as part of a team. I think it would take too much out of me to beat someone. In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised if beating someone was more exhausting than taking a beating. But this is something I don’t know anything about so I shouldn’t talk about it. This was always one of the things wrong with me growing up. Whenever mother asked what the fuck was wrong with me I could always answer that I talk when I should listen and that I don’t know anything. I remember I said something about apples once, how they were sprayed with pesticides and were toxic and mother beat me senseless. Sometimes she’d have some of my brothers and sisters help her and I think this was one of those times. I cannot say it was any worse than being beaten by a single individual. When you are being beaten it almost doesn’t matter how many people are doing it to you, although it probably is worse, now that I think about it. When you’ve been beaten as often as I have sometimes you have trouble thinking things through. This is another reason I am as tired as I am now and why later today I will hang myself in the backyard. Thinking takes too much out of me. It’
s because of the beatings, I’m almost certain. My memory has been compromised, which is why I haven’t had a peach in so long. The thought of a peach hasn’t even occurred to me during all this time. Certainly I must’ve eaten some kind of fruit over the years. One couldn’t live this long a life and not had any fruit during the course of it. What’s troubling is that I can’t remember eating any fruit other than peaches and I only just remembered that the other night. It stands to reason I’ve seen peaches at a grocer’s or in someone’s kitchen, but I have no memory of actually seeing peaches, let alone eating them. It is possible I’ve subsisted solely on meat and bread my entire adult life. I don’t think this is unusual or unique is what I think I’m trying to say. Anyone who has been beaten as often as I have would have a faulty memory and trouble thinking things through and as a result be as tired as I am now. Surely others have subsisted on meat and bread alone. The world is a big place and has a lot of people in it. My mother used to say this all the time. I think she meant that I could be replaced, that I wasn’t essential. This is yet another reason I’m no different, not by any measure. It is no wonder I will hang myself later in the backyard. The question is why I haven’t done so sooner. I have no answer to this question. Clearly, it was a mistake or a series of mistakes, not hanging myself sooner. I have made a great many mistakes. To go through the mistakes now would be pointless. The more pressing concern is will I have the energy or strength to hang myself later.

  I did practice hanging myself yesterday, to make sure I could do it properly. I went out to the backyard and positioned the step stool under the strongest branch of the oak tree. Of course, I’d prefer hanging myself from a peach tree, but there are no peach trees in the backyard and to traverse the countryside looking for a peach tree would take too much out of me. And I don’t know if a peach tree is strong enough to support my weight. The last time I checked I weighed upward of two hundred pounds. You wouldn’t think someone that substantial could be so fleet afoot, but you’d be wrong in my case. Out of all the things wrong with me this isn’t one of them. People are always impressed by my speed and agility. They say I move well for a big man, usually right before they start beating me. So, I gathered my two hundred pounds, stood on the step stool, swung the noose around the branch, and slipped it over my head. Obviously, I did not kick the step stool away, but I’m certain I can do this later without expending too much effort. Even still, I was exhausted after this dry run. I had to go straight to bed afterward and wound up sleeping for eighteen hours straight. Theoretically, I should be well rested for later, but that isn’t always the case. I can sleep for three days and wake up spent. This was another thing wrong with me growing up. I would wake up after sleeping for a full day and go downstairs and ask my mother, What’s for breakfast? And she would say, What the fuck is wrong with you? She would say that I missed breakfast and lunch and it was almost time for dinner. I would always apologize to her, but she never accepted my apologies. She said my apologies were insincere. She was probably right. She’d say I was just like my father and I couldn’t argue because I didn’t know what he was like, having never met the man. At this point in a conversation with her I would grow weary and announce that I had to go to bed. I would tell her I might not wake up this time so it could be goodnight maybe forever. She’d say none of us was that lucky. It was true, none of us was that lucky, except maybe when it came to my father. We never knew exactly what happened to him. Mother said she got lucky when he joined the navy and got killed in action overseas. I’m not sure any of us believed her, but we knew better than to ask questions. As I walked up the staircase to my bedroom I would tell her, Someday this luck will change, and she’d answer back, Don’t count on it unless you join the navy. Sometimes she would tell me to wait up so she could tuck me in, but she never actually meant that. The only time she would come into my room was when she meant to beat me.

  I don’t know why people always want to beat me, but they always have, from the time I was a small child. Back then they beat me at home, in school, at church, on the way home, the way to school, the way to church. Even when they took me to the hospital to mend my wounds, they’d beat me there, too. I can remember lying on a gurney in an ambulance and both the paramedic and driver taking turns. Then they’d hand me off to the doctors and nurses, who would continue the beating. Afterward I would get to rest. They would tell my mother, they would say, He needs rest.

  I think I could withstand the beatings better when I was younger. I know I was always tired, but probably not as often as I am now. I remember trying to sleep away as much of the day as possible. The day had nothing in it I wanted or needed to be awake for and I’m sure the feeling was mutual. Now, I know full well that days do not have feelings. Please don’t think that because I have trouble thinking things through or that I have made a great many mistakes that this is one of them. What I am saying is that no one occupying any part of the day cared one way or another if I was a fellow participant, a member of the team. My mother was one of these. Sometimes she’d see me downstairs and say, Who are you again? I told her I was passing through, to pay me no mind. My mother didn’t like it when I was fresh like this. That’s what she’d say, she’d say, Don’t be fresh. But just as a day has no feelings, neither did I growing up. I think I cried once after my mother called me a chickenshit bastard, but that was it. I must’ve been very young, perhaps only four or five. She laughed at me and asked, Did I hurt your feelings? I told her I had no feelings. She said I was a chip off the chickenshit block then. I think she was referring to my father, but I told her I didn’t care, and she said, Is that a fact, and I said, I believe so, yes. She said, We’ll see about that, and gave me a sound beating. She probably beat me for a solid fifteen minutes and I am proud to say I didn’t once cry during that particular beating or any subsequent beating, either.

  Every bone in my body has been broken multiple times and I have felt every single break, so some of what I say isn’t exactly the whole truth and nothing but.

  Because I was trying to sleep away as much of the day as I could my mother had a hard time waking me every morning for school. She would call up from downstairs and say, Start to stir. I almost never stirred when she commanded me to do so. I almost never obeyed the woman even though everyone else in the family was scared to death of her and rightly so. My mother was known to beat her children with rolling pins whenever they were disobedient. She would be downstairs beating my brothers and sisters and I would hear the crying and wailing from my bedroom. I would sometimes barricade myself in there, pushing a dresser in front of the door so Mother couldn’t get in. Sometimes she would rap against the door and call me chickenshit names for not having the balls to face her. I would tell her that my balls had nothing to do with it, that the sun was to blame. I’d tell her I was tired. I’d tell her I was allergic to the sun and she said, This is no way to go through life. She said I was probably anemic and chickenshit. I didn’t know what anemia was back then, but I don’t think I had it. Even still my mother tried to feed me steak cooked rare because of the anemia. She said it would help, that it fed the blood, that I was an embarrassment. She would plate a flank steak and tell everyone it was for her anemic chickenshit son and when I didn’t eat it she would beat all of my brothers and sisters right in front of me. She would say, See what you make me do, as she beat them. This is why my brothers and sisters used to beat me, too, because I never ate the bloody flank steak and they had the scars to prove it. I never blamed them, nor did I ever try to fight back. I always took the beatings lying down. Meaning I would lay myself down and wait for them to finish. I figured they would get tired or bored beating someone with anemia who took it lying down.

  I don’t think I’ve ever actually had anemia, though listlessness is a symptom. I have always been listless. Regardless, my anemia isn’t what makes me tired these days. It is probably because I am dying. I think this is the only explanation as to why I am even more tired than usual. But I am also hungry and I would think if one we
re dying one wouldn’t have an appetite at the same time.

  I should probably have a good last meal before I hang myself. I believe it’s customary. I almost never prepare a meal for myself as I am not worth the bother most of the time. Usually I eat soup from a can or dry toast and cereal. The last proper meal I had was about three months ago at a neighbor’s. Sometimes the neighbors see me crawling home after I’ve been beaten and they invite me into their home and tend to me. The neighbors here are good people and some of the very few who haven’t taken liberties with me. Apparently, one of them is a nurse, so she had all kinds of ointments and bandages to apply and fasten. I sat in the kitchen as she did this. I remember her asking me what happened, so I told her sometimes people like to beat me. She asked me why and I told her I had no idea but it’s always been the case. She asked me if she should call the police and I told her not to. All they would do is ask me questions and then get in a few licks of their own. After she mended my wounds she prepared an extravagant meal and insisted I stay for it. There were meat and potatoes and vegetables and gravy and bread, along with wine and water. They had me sit at the head of the table and made a point of calling me their guest. I ate all the food put in front of me. I didn’t want any of it, as I am rarely hungry after a beating. Still, I did my best to choke down my portions, though I declined a second helping. I didn’t know what was expected. I didn’t know if I was free to participate in the family conversation. It seems they were discussing the tribulations of the eldest son. He was having trouble in school and in danger of expulsion. He was probably guilty of beating his classmates, if I had to guess. He looked like a delinquent, with a thick neck that supported a cinder block of a head and big rough hands that seemed to have been in a fistfight recently. His arms and chest were especially well developed. He looked like the sort that could deliver a serious thrashing on someone. I cannot say I recognized him. Sometimes the neighborhood thugs have their way with me, but I do not think he is one of those. Not that I would necessarily know this one way or another. I don’t always look people in the eye when they are beating me. I learned this from my mother, as she didn’t like it when I looked her in the eye during a beating. As dinner went on, the nurse or her sons would sometimes look in my direction between forkfuls. They were trying not to, as they had excellent manners, but I could tell they were curious. I must’ve been a sight. I don’t believe I was still bleeding during dinner, but I was in a great deal of pain. I think I may’ve even groaned once or twice. The nurse asked if I was okay and I told her I was fine. I told her this was nothing, that I’d had worse. I told them all about the time my mother took us shopping and caught me handling the peaches. I was trying to fend for myself, like she’d taught me, but apparently this wasn’t the appropriate moment to do this. I thought she was down some other aisle as I approached the produce section and found a basket of peaches. After opening one of the plastic bags hanging from the hooks, I started examining them. The next thing I knew my mother was grabbing me by the collar and dragging me outside. She said, Who told you to touch the peaches? She said, Do you think people want to eat peaches after you’ve contaminated them with your filthy hands? Just as we got to the corner, I managed to break free and sprint down the street. I could hear my mother screaming for my brothers and sisters to chase after me. She said I was fast but had no endurance. She said, Stay on him, kids, he’ll wear down. She told them to wait for her before they did anything. I think I made it four or five blocks before I started cramping up. Everything hurts whenever I run for too long, my sides, my chest, even my head. I looked around for a place to hide, but there wasn’t any, so I waited for my brothers and sisters to catch up and, when they eventually did, said, What took you so long? They surrounded me and waited for our mother, who found her way over in a few short minutes. My mother was in better shape than she looked and was surprisingly agile. I think all of us in the family are good athletes. At any rate, she pulled some twine from her purse and instructed my brothers and sisters to tie me to a post. After my brothers and sisters complied, my mother said, You may commence. Ordinarily I prefer lying down during a beating, but there is no way to do this when you are strung up. I’ve only been strung up for a beating a few times and I can’t say I like it at all. It puts too much pressure on your wrists, arms, and shoulders. I don’t remember what happened afterward, as I probably lost consciousness. Sometimes this happens to me if the beating is particularly sound. I imagine they cut me down and took me home, where I probably slept straight through for a week. I told the nurse and her sons that the beating I took today was nothing compared to what happened that day after the peaches. I told them not to worry. I told them I always bounce back, that I’m tougher than I look. No one said much after my story, though I think I remember the nurse saying, You poor thing. I smiled at her and winked. I think she liked that. I don’t always remember to wink at people, but it’s a solid maneuver. I’ve even done it to one or two of those who’ve beaten me. I declined dessert but I sat at the table and sipped some tea. I watched them eat their pie, which apparently was homemade. It smelled good, but I couldn’t. The nurse said I should take a slice home and saved one for me. By this time it was clear everyone was getting tired. I needed to lie down. Eventually dessert was over and I was free to go. I waited for them to clear the table and then thanked everyone for the fine meal and hospitality.