by Herocious
that. No one, not even You, can try to tell me that epiphanies don’t exist.
What someone can dispute, even the likes of You, is my theory that epiphanies are more likely to happen in or around water.
But I’m not here to defend my theories. Epiphanies have a tendency to occur in or around water, and that’s something you/You either believe or don’t.
Case and point: Bridget and I are standing on a truly awesome balcony 40 stories in the air, overlooking Biscayne Bay. I’m watching a pattern in the bay and, farther out, the Atlantic Ocean, while my lover sips on some Italian beer with her girlfriend, the one who calls me grasshopper.
The currents move from east to west.
To the north, a weedline.
Stingrays surface like flying carpets from the depths, blow bubbles, and descend into the darkness, into the unknown. Some are large enough to create the wake of a boat, others are babies, and one is albino.
I stand on the balcony, around water, and I understand the necessity of prayer.
To pray for people, to love people enough that you pray for them, you give them love in words of silence, in intentions, in positive thoughts, in sunrise meditations, and in smiles.
I stand on this truly awesome balcony, full of charity through prayer, of caritas, bony elbows on the rail, and raindrops start falling from the heavens.
Concentric circles freckle Biscayne Bay. The albino stingray surfaces slowly from the dark depths and starts swimming south, a flying carpet.
I stretch my hand over the edge, palm facing up 40 stories in the air, and the same raindrops that freckle the bay where the stingray swims also freckle my fingers.
In this way, in water, another epiphany colors my eyes. Even the magnificence of nature pales in comparison to prayer, to unlimited loving kindness toward others.
6
To celebrate our 3.5-year anniversary, I suggest a picnic. It’s tough to go wrong with some soft French bread, Gouda cheese, and a bottle of wine. I’m not going to lie. I do think about getting 48 ounces of Steel Reserve instead of the sulfites, but something in me says the green glass bottle is more aesthetic than silver aluminum cans. And the sound of a cork popping is much more romantic than a gaseous exhale, although it is undeniable that Steel Reserve has sex appeal.
“Where should we go?” asks Bridget.
She’s on the other side of our Wall of Awesome, in the closet digging for something to wear.
“How about across the street to St. Edward’s? I scoped out the perfect spot.”
“Really?”
She likes the sound of this date. I’ve taken charge for once. I’ve made all the plans. All she has to do is follow my lead.
For the occasion, she braids her reddish gold hair into pigtails. She could pass for a schoolgirl, one much younger than an entering graduate student at the University of Texas. I take her hand, and we lock the door behind us.
On the walk to St. Edward’s, we pass a stand of free Austin Chronicle copies. I spontaneously grab one in case we want to do something fun after our celebratory picnic. I tuck it under my armpit and, close to Duke’s beer-and-wine mart, wait for the cobalt pedestrian to signal from the east side of Congress Ave.
Bridget, however, takes my wrist and ignores the significance of the orange static hand.
By way of explanation, she says, “I’ve been jaywalking all day.”
In silence, we walk uphill to the highest point at St. Ed’s. The steady climb makes my thighs burn. No one is around. Classes are out. The campus is desolate.
“Ooo whew, whew, whew, whew, whew,” goes the Grackle. “Crewhewwhew!”
“Did you bring the camera?” asks Bridget.
We’re still walking at a nice clip, holding hands.
“It’s in the bag,” I say, pumping her palm three times.
Then we walk more in silence.
And, a few minutes later, I announce,
“Here we are.”
Bridget looks north toward the skyline. It’s about three miles away. In the sunset, it still appears exactly like what it is, manmade muscle. Because I’m man (not fish), distant skylines always charge my blood with the promise of carnal adventures.
Going farther down the St. Ed’s slope, a 0.25-mile gravel track loops a mint green soccer field, and a set of five tennis courts silently awaits hard court players. Everything around us is so cultured and athletic. Is this Sparta?
I throw down our blue blanket and invite my lover to take a seat at what will be our dinner table. If there were a chair to gently push in behind her, consider it done.
“See that building over there?” I ask, pointing over her shoulder. “Abe says that may be the best existing example of Victorian architecture in Texas.”
“It’s beautiful,” says Bridget. “How old do you think it is?”
“I think it was built sometime in the 1880’s,” I say, giving her an educated guess. “At least that was when this university was founded.”
Bridget folds her hands elegantly on her lap and smites me with eyes full of love. I blush, look down at a long leaf of grass, and shake my head until the blushing fades. To save myself from becoming pointless, I pop the wine cork and pour a healthy, full glass for Bridget, and then an equally full glass for me.
“Ooh,” she says, “Italian Pinot Grigio, my favorite. Make a toast.”
“To our life in Austin,” I say. “Cheers.”
“To our life in Austin,” says Bridget. We clink crystal, “Cheers.”
I suggest finishing a glass before eating. Drinking on an empty stomach makes me a lot drunker, a lot sooner. Bridget agrees this is the goal of drinking. We do that thing.
“But I’m hungry,” she cautions.
For nostalgia’s sake, when we’re almost through our second glass and halfway into our hearty victuals, I ask if she remembers the raccoons that surrounded us on our first anniversary picnic in North Miami Beach. We hunted for a secluded spot, and I thought we found one in Greynold’s Park. But it wasn’t so. There’s always someone watching.
“I even tried the paddle ball racquets,” she says, her cheeks flushed. “Remember? I smacked them together to make them scared.”
“I know!” I say. “But they weren’t fazed at all.”
“No,” she says, “not at all. It was intimidating how bold they were. Four of them!”
“Raccoons will be raccoons,” I say. “At least we managed to get all our stuff together.”
“True.”
In a moment of silence, I take a peek at the Austin Chronicle. The cover story is about some guy named Caleb Berwanger, the mastermind behind this company that opened to the public after months of testing with city officials. I’ve seen the little cars driving around Austin. They’re white and blue and really small. I turn to the article to remember what the company is called. While thumbing through, an ad catches my eye. Some guy with a thick beard and the hieroglyph:
LI(F)E
I read the details.
“You won’t believe it,” I say.
“What?” Bridget is being extra still so the butterfly on her shirt doesn’t fly away.
“Sage Francis is giving a free in-store performance at Waterloo. Apparently, he released a new album.”
“Get out!”
“I’m serious. Tuesday at 5PM. There’s probably going to be free Shiner, too.”
“What’s the album called?”
“Life, with a parenthesis around the F.”
Bridget sheds light:
“‘Because life is just a lie with an F in it.’ He sings that in one of his songs. Damn, Sage must be extremely disillusioned with all these wars. We’ve been in Afghanistan 109 months.”
Bridget quotes Sage again:
“‘Just bring home my motherfuckin’ brothers and sisters!’ No one is listening, Sage. No one is listening.”
“Nope.” I shake my head. I say, “Almost a decade of war.”
Gunshots!
Taps plays in my ears.
Salute!
But the bugle of death isn’t enough. The bugle of death doesn’t justify anything.
I quote another protest song.
I sing, “I got soul, but I’m not a soldier.”
“Who’s that?” asks Bridget.
“The Killers,” I say.
“Ah,” she says, “the irony.”
Bridget nods her chin, smiling at the butterfly as it ever so slowly spreads its inkblot wings, and stays. I turn the pages of the Chronic some more and find the cover story. I scan the salient points.
Car2Go: not very clever, but it gets the message across. Car2Go is a concept that first came about in Ulm, Germany. Caleb Berwanger got wind of the company after a visit there. It’s a really simple idea. Basically, legal drivers can become members for free. Whenever they need a ride, they find one of the white and blue cars that, according to the article, will soon be within three minutes walking distance of any point in the city, and they pay by the minute, like some cell phones. Fuel and insurance are built into this unit cost.
“Have you heard about this?” I ask.
“Yeah,” says Bridget, and the butterfly flits downhill. “What’s the deal?”
She snatches the Chronic from my grip to read the story at her own blazing rate. I try to paraphrase, but she flips the page before I mention Berwanger.
Wow, I think, how does she read so fast?
She freezes.
“What?” I ask. “What is it?”
Bridget has her hand over her mouth to block the gasp. She stares at the next page, the one I never got to because I read too slowly. I scoot over on our blue blanket and squint. Bridget can’t speak. I try to read her eyes, but they’re wide and blank, then I look at the page closely. There’s a black-and-white picture of a familiar face. I can’t quite place it, though.
“Is that Caleb Berwanger?” I ask.
Bridget kills her wine and nods, her eyes screwed to the page.
“What’s wrong with you? You’re starting to worry me.”
Who cares if that’s Caleb Berwanger? I think. Did she go to school with the guy? She can be so unpredictable when she looks wide-eyed. She’s liable to say anything, anything at all. Maybe this has something to do with the Mindless Mohawk.
“Isn’t that,” she begins, “isn’t that the leprechaun?”
I take the Chronic from her hand. It can’t be. But it is. The elfish nose. He looks drunk, like he did that night we saw him loitering outside HEB with a Dr. Pepper bottle, homeless. I take it that his name is Caleb Berwanger.
So, I think, the leprechaun is the CEO of Car2Go. The bum with schizophrenia wasn’t crazy after all when he talked about his Smart cars. He was biding his time. He was fine-tuning his enterprise. And now he’s an Austin bigshot, living large on Mount Bonnell, and what am I?
I shake my head at the same long leaf of grass, now crimson from the blush it absorbed. Bridget is quiet next to me, staring at the skyline that won’t let me enter. I feel myself becoming pointless. No. I pour a third round of wine. It’s too late, though.
Q: What am I?
A: A writer manqué.
Q: What am I?
A: A milksop.
Q: What am I?
A: A fetid mind.
I remember the lascivious eyes of the leprechaun when he stared like some pervert at my lover, and I feel sorry for Bridget. That she should have to live with a pointless man when a man who has a point could whisk her away. As if sensing me appraising my shortcomings, Bridget latches her arm around my waist and laughs it all away. Positivity, she means to say. Positivity is all there’s time for on earth. Think positive, Michael. She means to say, I’m yours forever, all you have to do is hold me.
“I love you.”
“I love you.”
Not quite knowing why, I pull out our bridge camera and set it up on a mini-tripod. I frame the shot and set the timer. I sit exactly where I was sitting, and in five seconds the red light blinks and the shutter opens and closes. We’re both smiling, the crowns of our heads touching. Sometimes I think pictures like these aren’t really good for a person’s health. Portraits taken right after feeling hurt or, as in my case, inadequate can only shed esteem. Nevertheless, this is our 3.5-year anniversary photo. Let it make us stronger.
4
I’ve been meaning to get to Archer City for a little while now. I’ve been gestating this memory for longer than it takes to ripen. It’s ready. On the outside, it’s avocado green, and on the inside, creamy yellow. It’s strange, the feeling you get when you know a memory is finished. When you know there’s nothing left. Everything is as it should be.
A life isn’t worth more than a handful of words.
You see: I’ve written too much already. But, to my credit, this memory isn’t only about me. There’s more than me in this memory. That’s what makes it pretty.
Archer City would be nothing without Larry McMurtry. His bookstore occupies most of downtown. I haven’t gone in yet because I wanted to wait until I got here to finish longhand. I’m in the Civic. The engine is off. My wrists are the first to start sweating. It’s hotter here than in Austin. The only reason anyone would ever voluntarily spend time in this forsaken place is if they have blood buried in this land, like McMurtry. But I’m sure that most Archer City natives leave their origin as soon as they find a route to the city. Population is on the decline. Archer City is a vestigial outpost. Once it may have been the frontier, now it’s a rabid dog in need of a bullet to the head.
I almost crank the AC, but roll down my window instead. Bridget does the same and fans her cheeks. The cross breeze is no respite. The pores on my face and upper back dilate. My knees begin to sweat. Soon my cotton boxer shorts and socks get leaden with the weight of water.
How will the Texas Man of Letters receive a wannabe writer? Will he graciously take the manila envelope with my manuscript in it and toss it on his own personal pile of slush? I won’t stop him. I’ll understand. People only have two hands, after all.
Be positive, I think. Positivity has carried you this far. Just stick to your lines. Find him and ask, How many times in your life have you had the chance to Make Dreams Come True? Wait for him to think of an answer, but don’t wait for him to answer. Then say, We’re both human here. Let’s help each other.
Salt from my upper lip coarsens my tongue. Salinity. I touch Honeyed Cat’s head. She flashes jade at me and purrs. I pump Bridget’s thigh three times. My skin is convex on the surface of her eyes. What was that? A pinprick on my neck. Not good. A cello sounds a black note that’s sustained.
Oh, Watson, the needle!
7
At first I don’t know what happened. Michael drops his pen and says, “Take,” but when I look at him it’s clear something’s wrong. He should be telling me more than to take his memory.
Then I see a wasp poised on his jugular. I swat the yellow and black demon outside with his manuscript and frantically roll our windows. Michael is frightened. Fear makes him look like a mother’s son. I remind him not to worry. We have an EpiPen, right?
He shakes his beautiful face. His hair crinkles against the headrest. He studies his hands, the spreading rash on his palms, and sadness makes him choke.
“Isn’t it in the glove compartment?” I ask.
“No,” he says. He drops his hands and tries shutting his eyes. He can’t. “I moved it to our camera case,” he tells me, faltering. “Which I didn’t bring. Fuck me.”
“Okay,” I say. I say, “Don’t worry, Viejo. Don’t worry.”
“Why me?” he moans. “Why me, dear Lord?”
I call 911 and walk Michael across the street to Booked Up.
Bells jingle as I calmly beg for help. The stubborn silence of books answers. What good are they? I scream like a savage. This time someone appears. An old man.
“Are you Larry McMurtry?” I ask.
“No,” he says, “but I can fetch him for you.”
“This is Michael, my boyfriend,” I say, tryin
g to be clear and concise. “He’s allergic to bees and wasps.”
“That’s too bad,” says the old man. “There’s lots of them ‘round here.”
The old man isn’t sarcastic. He lifts Michael’s face by the chin and shakes his head and realizes the situation is grave. I stare at the empty street and wonder how much longer. The token tumbleweed rolls by like an animated piece of eco-art.
“Larry!” yells the old man, “you wouldn’t happen to have a shot of adrenaline handy in your store, would you?”
When there’s no answer, I start to cry.
“Now you hold on there, Dear,” says the old man. He reassuringly braces my elbow. “You hold on while I go fetch Larry.”
Apparently, the celebrated writer is disposed because the old man returns as he left, alone. I’m wondering if this is really how it’s going to end – is this it? – when the old man solemnly reaches into the back pocket of his jeans.
“Oh, thank God!” I say, and I don’t even believe in God. “Thank you!”
It’s almost too good to be true, the way this old man fills a syringe with adrenaline from a honey-colored phial, rolls Michael’s sleeve, and deftly sticks the needle in between the sinews of his shoulder.
“Don’t thank me,” says the old man. “Thank Larry.”
END
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