Exile on Kalamazoo Street

by Michael Loyd Gray

  “Wonderful,” he said. “Marvelous. What do you teach her now?”

  “Oh, you know … a little of this, a little of that. I think mostly she’s now teaching me some things.”

  “That’s the mark of a good teacher, I suspect,” he said. “That she keeps coming back to see you.”

  “She does,” I said, “keep coming.”

  He nodded approvingly. I went to the kitchen and refilled his cup and squeezed a generous dollop of honey into it. And I resolved to tone it down a bit. He was probably not as bad a guy as I imagined him to be because of his strident insistence on pushing his faith. He just believed. He’d made up his mind and set his course and felt he was sailing toward his true north. That was something to be admired. Or at least, grudgingly respected.

  “Just the right amount of honey,” he said, quickly taking a second sip. And then a third.

  “That’s what my former student says, Reverend.”

  Okay, okay, I told myself, enough with the snarkiness. You’ve had your fun. You amused yourself. You can tell Elsa all about it and have a good laugh. And then hose her down with some more honey. Ha! Ha!

  “Bryce,” he said after yet another sip and a pause for effect. “How are you, truly? I have worried about you. I have prayed for you, of course.”

  “Kind of you, Reverend. But I suspect I’m fine.”

  “But this exile … it can’t be your future.”

  “I doubt it’s my future, Reverend. It’s merely my now.”

  “The now has a way of slipping away from us and becoming the future,” he said.

  I wondered if he had a job before becoming God’s messenger. I felt he might have made a good auto salesman. A reverend, after all, is a born salesman. Likely he went straight from college to whatever school it is that manufactures reverends.

  “But Reverend, the now is really all we have.”

  “And yet we must also plan for the future. Live with an eye toward our futures. Both here, on earth, and beyond.”

  “Beyond,” I said, also pausing for effect. “That’s an awesome concept … beyond.”

  “Do you believe in the hereafter, Bryce?”

  “The hereafter? That makes it sound like there’s just clearly the one, the only hereafter destination. Oz, Valhalla. I can’t recall some of the other names for it. Well, heaven, of course. And … paradise. Club Med, though, is probably stretching it.”

  “Indeed,” he said quietly. “But do you believe, Bryce.”

  I sagged into my chair and sighed. It was perhaps too early in the day to wrestle with immortality. It was certainly too early for strident reverends, but I had let him in and so I deserved what came of it.

  “That’s a tough one, Reverend. That one requires faith.”

  “Faith is the key,” he said, leaning forward and clasping hands on thighs. He looked capable of dropping to his knees to implore me to pray with him.

  “Indeed,” I said.

  “Tell me about your faith, Bryce.”

  “I don’t know what to tell you, Reverend.”

  “What do you believe?”

  I had images of Elsa, naked. And in one of her crotchless body stockings.

  “That’s a toughie, Reverend. I’m drawing a blank there.”

  I thought of how Elsa liked to bend over my bed naked and wiggle her butt.

  He leaned back against the sofa, his hands still clasped in his lap. He sighed, but it was not a loud sigh and did not seem terribly impatient or reproachful. Perhaps somewhat impatient. Slightly impatient.

  “Do you believe in heaven, Bryce?”

  “You’re not first going to ask if I believe in God?”

  “Would you be more comfortable if I did?”

  “Not really. Both are toughies, Reverend. Both are minefields.”

  “Minefields?” He looked annoyed but managed to suppress it quickly enough.

  “Sure,” I said. “No matter where you step, you risk it all blowing up in your face.”

  He tapped his finger on a knee for a few seconds and squinted at me … a little bit like that hard-ass squint Clint Eastwood gave the bad guys in spaghetti westerns. Just before he shot them.

  “Maybe life has a minefield aspect,” he said, the tone of his voice not conceding my point. “Sometimes. I can see that. I can sort of concede that. But faith in something greater than life here. It transforms life here into something wonderful.”

  Yes, I could see the good reverend selling cars.

  “Indeed,” I said.

  * * *

  There were fleeting signs of the spring to come, but spring was still lurking behind a distant corner and dragging its feet. There was no more snow falling and none predicted, and only scraps of snow still lingered in places where shade kept the remnants alive. My yard had snowy patches under the bare trees, but the dormant brown-green grass dominated and squirrels dashed busily from tree to tree, leaving tracks only in the white patches.

  The winds arrived from wherever winds live and prosper, and they lingered for several days, vacuuming the landscape and sucking plastic bags from open dumpsters and pummeling them against trees and into branches to twist grotesquely. Black Kitty’s ears would perk up as bursts and shears of wind would rattle up and down the chimney.

  At night it was still cold, but not arctic anymore, and on some days the sun would peek out from behind billowing clouds that somehow did not produce thunderstorms, though those storms were coming. The sun would disappear again, but during the days of false spring the sun beamed without radiating much heat as it tried to marshal strength for days coming.

  There was a day when the sun wanted to reassert itself, batting clouds aside and peeking out here and there. Then, abruptly, wet snowflakes floated down—not many and for only a few minutes. They melted right away and then the sun had better luck as the clouds thinned into puffs of white-gray smoke.

  * * *

  I was napping on the sofa with Joyce’s Dubliners open on my chest and Black Kitty draped across my legs. Several times I woke up, groggy, as wind rattled the roof or tumbled down the chimney, and then slid back into sleep. I dreamed about why Dubliners is so good and readable and Ulysses is genius but unreadable—to me, anyway. I woke up again to a pounding sound. Black Kitty jumped to the floor and ran into the kitchen. The pounding continued and finally I understood it was someone pounding on the front door. I peeked out and saw a former colleague from the college—Paul Herringer, a decent poet and decent friend in those days—as he gazed down the street. I didn’t think he saw me, and I considered just retreating back to the living room and waiting for him to give up and leave, but he knocked again, just as insistently, and so I pulled the curtain aside and smiled as genuinely as I could.

  “The side door, Paul,” I said, motioning in that direction with my hand. “Go to the side door.”

  He smiled and nodded enthusiastically, and by the time I opened the side door he was there, still smiling. He offered a hand and we shook. His grip was firm and I adjusted mine to be firmer. He had grown a beard since I’d last seen him, and it had come out mostly white. Perhaps he’d intended it as a counter-balance to his receding hairline, a function it fulfilled nicely, if my first impression was correct.

  “You look well, Bryce,” he said. “It’s been a while.”

  “It has, it has,” I said, nodding and then glancing down my faded Levi’s at my white-socked feet, unsure of the right answer.

  “Your hair has really grown,” he said.

  “Has it?” I said absently.

  “Quite a bit. Are you auditioning for a rock band?”

  “No, no. Nothing so exotic. Just a new look.”

  We stared uneasily at each other a moment.

  “Well, come on in,” I said. “Watch the steps up to the landing.”

  In the kitchen he offered a hand a second time, more awkward than the first.

  “I’m going to make tea, Paul. How does that sound?”

  “Good, good,” he said, clearly
nervous. “I’d love some.”

  He went into the living room as I boiled water. I was grateful for the task and a few minutes to ready myself psychologically for company.

  “You have a cat,” he called out.

  “Yes,” I called back, annoyed at having to raise my voice.

  “What’s its name, Bryce?”

  “He answers to Black Kitty.”

  “Not a very ambitious name for a writer, Bryce.”

  “Who said I was a writer?” I said as I poured honey into our tea mugs. There was no reply. I had already heard my first name invoked too many times.

  I handed him his mug and sat in a chair opposite the sofa. Black Kitty sat on the sofa with Paul, but at some distance to indicate cautious hospitality. Cat etiquette. As we sipped tea, Black Kitty abruptly jumped off the sofa and onto the back of my chair. He curled up behind my head to peek out over my shoulder at Paul.

  “It’s loyal to you,” Paul said.

  “I feed him.”

  “The same thing, Bryce,” Paul said.

  “Something like that.”

  Paul was older than me, in his late fifties—fifty-eight, if I recalled correctly. It made me think suddenly of a birthday coming in June. I would be fifty-one. I had not thought about age much in exile.

  “How’s your tea, Paul?”

  “The honey always makes the difference.” He held his mug up in salute. It made me think of people in bars raising beer mugs or shot glasses.

  “Honey’s my new religion, Paul.”

  “Really?” He cocked his head to the side as though actually assessing this proclamation.

  “No. I’m just saying that to make conversation.”

  We studied each other a moment and sipped tea.

  “How’s life at the college?” I said.

  “Good, good,” he said, nodding his head. “Folks ask about you from time to time.”

  “Some probably do,” I said. “Some probably don’t.”

  “Kathryn Miller asks about you, Bryce.”

  “How is Kathryn Miller these days?”

  “She’s the department chair now, Bryce. Since January.”

  “How nice for her ambitions,” I said. “Has she got the rest of you wearing uniforms yet?”

  He nodded and smiled knowingly. “No, no. Well, not yet, anyway.”

  “Plenty of time for it,” I said. “See if she’ll go for the beret and turtleneck sweater look, Paul. I think a beret might suit you.”

  He wrinkled his nose and sipped tea.

  “She’s not so bad,” he said. “And she did ask about you.”

  “Tell her I’m alive. And kicking. Don’t I look it?”

  “I can see that,” he said. “You look … younger.”

  “Maybe it’s the hair.” I shrugged my shoulders.

  “And you look … healthier, too,” he said. “Have you lost weight?”

  “Nearly ten pounds.”

  He nodded approvingly and raised his mug again.

  “Must be your diet, Bryce.”

  “And I don’t drink.”

  “Ah,” he said, arching his eyebrows. “How’s that going?”

  “There’s no booze in the house.”

  “I was just asking,” he said, staring into his teacup.

  “That’s okay, Paul. How are you doing?”

  “No real complaints.” He raised his mug in salute again.

  “How’s Sheila?”

  “Good, good.” He nodded and chewed his lip. “We went through a bad spell there for a bit.” He looked off at the wall. “But I think we reeled the thing back in.”

  “Good,” I said, raising my mug. “Here’s to fishing.”

  “Fishing?” He looked confused.

  “You said you reeled it back in. Marriage can be like fishing. You need to use the right bait.”

  He smiled, nodded. “That’s the writer in you, Bryce.”

  I smirked. “There’s that accusation again.”

  “Are you back at it … writing?”

  “No, I’m not. Not in a long time.”

  “How long?” he said.

  “Several years.”

  “But you did fine when you were, Bryce.”

  “That last one went nowhere.”

  He forced a smile. “I thought it was fine.”

  My turn to force a smile. “It was a stinker, Paul.”

  “That’s harsh,” he said. “Do you really think so?”

  “Yeah, I do. But thanks for trying to make me feel good.”

  He rubbed a finger absently across his chin.

  “Bryce … nothing’s ever as good as they claim, or as bad as they charge us with.”

  I chuckled and sipped tea and thought about it a moment. It was a nice line. If I were writing, I’d like that line. Maybe I’d steal that line. I leaned my head into Black Kitty and he rubbed his face against my cheek.

  “But what do you really think, Paul?”

  He hesitated. “Certainly it wasn’t a stinker.”

  “But ….”

  “Well, it wasn’t as much fun as the other two, Bryce. I guess that’s how I’d put it. That doesn’t make it bad. It was just different than the first two. A new direction, perhaps.”

  “A dead end, you mean.”

  “I wouldn’t go that far, Bryce.”

  “How far would you go?”

  “It’s different among friends,” he said. “The politics of criticism are different.”

  “We’re still friends?”

  “Of course. Did you think we weren’t, Bryce?”

  “I don’t know,” I finally said. “It’s been a long few months, I guess.”

  “Exile can’t be easy.”

  “But it’s been necessary.”

  “I guess I see that, Bryce.”

  “Do you?”

  “I don’t know. I’m trying to. What matters is how you see it, I suppose.”

  Black Kitty slipped off the back of the chair and into my lap.

  “I’m still working on how I see it, Paul.”

  He nodded. “Understandable.”

  “Are you sure?” I said.

  “Reasonably.” He shrugged his shoulders. “You really haven’t been outside at all?”

  “Not since Christmas.”

  “Not a foot outside?” Paul said.

  “No, that’s the rule. The prime directive: no foot set outside. No full foot.”

  “No full monty?”

  “No,” I laughed. “Certainly no full monty.”

  “How about toes?” he said, grinning.

  “Once. One time I dipped my toes in the snow. Not as much fun as dipping toes off a dock in summer.”

  “I can imagine,” he said. “So, when does it end?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “This … exile,” he said.

  I rubbed Black Kitty behind the ears and watched his eyes slowly close.

  “I guess it ends when it ends. All things end when they end.”

  Chapter 9: Even More of the Middle of the Actual Beginning

  Abruptly, rudely, winter declined its invitation to leave. The morning after Paul’s visit, I woke up to drifting flakes, and the backyard was painted white again. Squirrels perched on branches and seemed as disappointed as I was. But it was not very cold. I stuck a bare foot out the sliding deck door and knew the snow would melt quickly. The forecast predicted rain soon, though the forecast had not predicted snow.

  My sister Janis—named for Janis Joplin and not resembling Joplin in appearance or behavior—showed up at a little after five with supplies. I invited her in, which surprised her. She had cut her long blond hair into something that struck me as perky, trendy. It framed her broad face nicely. I supposed she was still young enough to worry about trends and what vacuous people on TV looked like, despite leaning a bit too far toward the limited Republican view of the world. Still, the haircut suited her.

  “How’s that old black cat?” she said in the kitchen as she slipped off he
r navy peacoat and brushed her new bangs out of her eyes.

  “He’s around here somewhere,” I said as I emptied grocery bags on a counter and she handed me butter, milk, eggs, and yogurt for the refrigerator.

  “Is he good company?”

  “He doesn’t say much. We communicate nicely by telepathy, though.”

  She laughed and stacked cans of cat food on a shelf.

  “You always liked cats, Bryce. Even when we were kids.”

  “Cats always seemed to speak my language, Janis. And I guess I speak theirs.”

  She leaned her back into a counter and watched me arrange things in the refrigerator.

  “I still remember that big old orange one, Bryce. When we lived in Indiana.”

  “EH,” I said as I closed the refrigerator door. “That was one hell of a cat.”

  “He liked to sleep on my feet,” she said, “keep them warm.”

  “Mine, too,” I said.

  “I didn’t know what EH stood for until I was in high school and you’d gone off to college,” she said. “I just thought it was initials and kind of a weird name.”

  Memories of childhood washed over me: some good, some not so good. Dead history.

  “Everyone thought I was odd to call a cat Hemingway, so I shortened it to EH,” I said. “I had just read The Old Man and the Sea in junior high school.”

  We went into the living room and Janis sat on a sofa. I rummaged through the bookshelf next to the fireplace and found my battered old copy of The Old Man and the Sea. To myself I read the brilliant opening sentence about the tragic old man who could not catch a fish. The cadence and rhythm of it was still remarkable to me.

  “Read it aloud, Bryce,” she said. “Just some of it.”

  I read the wonderful opening sentence and several paragraphs after that. Then I closed the book and studied the cover a moment before finding it a more prominent place on the shelf.

  “His writing is sort of like music,” she said.

  “That’s one of the secrets to writing, I think.”

  “Making it like music?” she said.

  “Yes, making it have rhythm. Making the language of a book have rhythm, that is. That’s what carries the story.”

  She nodded. It was very quiet for a moment.

  “I could make tea,” she said.

  “Go ahead. Lots of honey in mine.”