Ain't No Sunshine

sixteen

"Tell me about your wife..."

Gretna asked, having no idea what the question would bring up. It hung there in the bright afternoon and she noticed immediately that the easy posture of Roscoe had changed. It was like the bones in his face were struggling with the muscles, like they might pull from the skin all together.

People don't die like they do in the movies. They don't leave this earth with a perfect last statement. There is no angelic moment of clarity. There is only confused looks, lack of breath and a desperate gasping in fear and disbelief. Roscoe had seen people die in the years he spent in the Nam. He had seen a few more stateside, when he found himself at roadside accidents that seemed to find him like a curse. He wished he could drive by, but the medic in him made him stop, and made him help. It was a sore spot between he and Lilly. She hated stopping for stranded motorists and she detested how her life was disrupted by Roscoe's crusade. She had been a nurse in the war and when she came home she vowed to never have blood on her hands again. She never worked as a nurse again, and she never went back to school like she had dreamed as a girl. She wanted to live a quiet life, without the screams of young men echoing in her head. But Roscoe couldn't pass by anyone in need. He would forget whatever was going on in their life. The day would been spent getting parts for broken cars, ferrying people around that they didn't know, and on a few occasions, giving C.P.R. or keeping pressure on a wound.

"She was my angel."

Roscoe said as he looked out the window.

"You know all my life I always wondered about men that complained about their wives. Men that couldn't wait to get to a bar. These guys that say their wives gained weight, or nagged. I never tired of looking at my Lilly. Our lives weren't perfect and Lord, she used to get mad at me, but I never tired of looking at her. I never fought back when she got angry. Maybe I was just simple minded. Maybe I should have fought but, whenever she got upset, I just couldn't ignore how child like she became. I never forgot how much I loved her. I never forgot the good times. I couldn't get angry. Even when she was mad as the devil, I was still happy to be near her. We used to go hours without talking, we would sit and read or make dinner, we were always together. We would put on music and when a song came on that we loved, we would dance a little, you know? Just for a minute or two. No matter what was going on in our lives, she would look up at me and I'd remember those great days in Europe, driving around with nothing but a day and a map in front of us. She wore rose water perfume. I loved the way she smelled."

It was a beautiful day outside and Roscoe clinched his eyes together as hard as he could. The trauma always lurked right below the surface of his skin, just out of sight. Working on old things and making them run, held it all at bay. He would work himself into a walking coma and at the end of the day he'd eat, have a glass of wine and drift off to a place where he could still take Lilly for a turn around the dance floor. He would wake in a fog and move into another day.

"It was August twenty first, nineteen eighty five."

Roscoe gripped his hat like a rope and his hands twisted the fabric into a crumpled knot as he spoke.

"There was a lady standing next to her car on highway twenty seven. It was drizzling like it does ever summer day around three or four in the afternoon. We were on our way to a restaurant, it was our anniversary. She wore a special dress with flowers on it. I can remember it waving in the breeze, as we drove with the windows down. She held the dress in place with her hands and pushed the material down between her knees. She saw the car before I did and her face showed she was mad before I stopped. When I pulled over she asked me to just keep going, but the lady looked so lost and her hood was up. It was starting to rain harder and I told Lilly it would just be a minute. She slapped her purse against her legs when I got out. Her car was half in the slow lane and I told her to get in while I pushed it out of the way. I was preoccupied with trying to get her situated when I heard the tires sliding on the pavement. It was a weird sound like a fingernail on canvas, and then I heard the crash."

Roscoe pulled a handkerchief from his pocket and dabbed his eyes. His head was down and his other hand held onto the hat for dear life. Gretna wished she had never asked, she wished she could pour them a drink, she wished she could get away. She stared spell bound at the man she hardly knew, lost in a story he didn't want to tell. He was powerless to stop it from running over the levy, and it spilled out of him like a violent wall of water that nothing could hold back.

"She looked fine, there was just a little goose egg on her head. When I got to her she was so confused and she looked up at me like she didn't understand what happened. The man in the truck that hit her was yelling at me and for a spilt second I thought we would be fine, she tried to say something, but the life ran out of her and she stopped breathing. I got her out and started C.P.R. I could hear her ribs breaking as I pushed on her chest. I gave her breaths and and pushed and checked her pulse. It went on forever until the fireman pulled me off her. I fell down there in the gravel next to the road. There wasn't any room for me in the ambulance. I could see them working on her. I prayed to God there on the side of the road. The last thing I can remember was seeing her dress move in the wind as they closed the doors. Those little flowers, white and purple, the radio was still playing. All she wanted was a nice dinner. She was all dressed up."

Roscoe let the tension leave his hands and he wiped his eyes. His chest rose and fell slowly as he returned to his world as it was now. He sighed and stared off to nowhere.

"August twenty first was the day we married, the happiest day of my life. The insurance company settled out of court and I got more money that I ever dreamed of getting, enough to live on forever. That's the joke God played on me. I didn't have to work anymore, but it was all I could do to stay alive.  I had to keep living. So everyday I get up, I try to fix something, I try to make it up to my Lilly. It ain't ever enough. The grass grows back, the dishes get dirty, the house gets painted and Lilly's still gone."

He hit his hat against his leg and a small cloud of red dust drifted away from him in the breeze.

"I'm sorry Gretna. I know you didn't.....I have to go."

Roscoe pulled open the screen door, walked through it and let it slam. His big feet dug into the gravel as he strode away to his car. She heard the old V.W. start up and he drove away, without waving.

Gretna plopped onto a stool and let out a deep breath. She pushed the cold coffee away from her, hit the counter with her hand and shook her head. It was such a nice day, a few minutes ago.

W.B.Z.N.

Diamonds and Rust

Fifteen

It was the scraping sound that Gretna noticed first and then the birds. Sounds you miss when in hospital. She smelled coffee on the stove and noticed chairs askew at the kitchen island. The house was a marvel. In the dungeon of bitterness she had built, she never dreamed that light could return to this house. The sun was beaming through the trees across St. Augustine road and she thought of the old days when she walked the old dirt paths. She wandered those fields with Kerry when hope of his return still hung in the air like a kite. She poured coffee and walked painfully to the porch supporting herself on furniture as she moved, to see the source of the sounds, coming from outside.

Roscoe was working a soft block sander on the curves of the old bus. The inside was gutted and transported back to his house piece by piece. The motor, rear end and transmission were nearly done. There was nothing left but to sand and massage the body. Roscoe lost himself bringing the old bus back to the smooth curvaceous beauty she was when she left Stuttgart back in 64. She was sea foam green with a white seats and matching door panels. Roscoe checked the numbers on her and found her whole story, just like him she had a long journey. He stood upright and stretched his aching back looking for low spots in the panel he had sanded.

Gretna lit her one and only cigarette for the day. She allowed herself one, and only one when the boys were not around. Life with no vice is no life at all, and so she hid a pack and kept one little secret connection to her former self.  She looked at the new railing and porch, and briefly thought of her fall back to grace. She was eating right, not drinking and her family was around her again. She went to physical therapy twice a week and met with a nutritionist once a month. She was thirty five pounds lighter and able to walk a little everyday. She had awakened from a spell. Fifteen years of bitter torment at her own hand had ended with a fall in dog shit. The dog looked like a show winner, after that Roscoe man nursed it back to health. Rooney sat wagging, waiting for an invitation to be petted. It was as if he had forgiven her, but still remembered the fire she used to spew at him. Dogs move forward, and Gretna had too. Being broken into pieces had afforded her the opportunity to be put back together again.

Roscoe was finally down past the body line, below the windows. All the corners were repaired, sanded and the floor was finished and primed. The fender wells were tough,  but now nothing stood between this bus being done and Roscoe except the vast expanse of sheet metal below the windows. It was mostly flat and easy going from here. Then the she would go to the body shop for paint rubber and windows. Roscoe heard Gretna calling from the porch and wondered how this would play out. They really hadn't spoken in the hospital, and he worried about what she might say. Kerry had told him a lot about the woman and most was not good. He clapped his hands together and a cloud of maroon dust expanded in front of him.

"Mr. Roscoe? Roscoe?"

Gretna called out to the garage and finally he appeared into the sun light. He patted his overalls shaking loose what ever dust that still hung to him and wandered out toward the porch.

"Thank you for the swing. And all of this."

She motioned around her and up into the air at all the improvements he had done around the house and property.

"Would you like a cup of coffee?"

He nodded and walked slowly to her. He used to get a lot more done when there was nobody around. Now he'd have to get to know her, and the solitude of working on the bus would be harder to find. But is was only a few more days and then the trailer would come. Once it was painted, it would be brought back to his house and he could put her right, in the silence of his shop. Just the Reverend Al Green, Curtis Mayfield and Marvin Gaye, and Roscoe doing work. Roscoe liked it that way.

"I guess I have you to thank for amazing transformation around here, are you working on that old bus?"

Gretna poured the coffee while Roscoe rotated his hat in his hand in the doorway.

"Come in and sit down. Cream and sugar?"

Roscoe nodded yes and sat in the chair by the counter.

"How'd she pay for all this? I know Kerry doesn't have any money."

"Well, some of the wood came from the part that fell down, and there was some lumber out there in the garage. I had some things around my house, shingles and some paint. I never throw anything away that's useful. Kerry got some insurance money for some of it and I guess the money I paid her for the bus covered everything on the inside. She never told you about any of this?"

"No, I guess she wanted it to be a surprise, and she didn't want to argue about it. Well now, you have seen me half naked and I hardly know anything about you!"

Roscoe howled and laughed at her directness. He hadn't laughed in a long time and had a little trouble stopping. The vision of her and the comedy of errors when he found her was a fresh memory. It was all funny now that she had recovered. 

"Well I am sorry about that, it was a windy day and I am afraid that dress wasn't made for rough weather. I hope you are not embarrassed. I used to be a medic in the army and it's all just the human body to me. I must say I have seen some people that were tore up pretty good, but I don't think I ever saw someone covered in dog mess before!"

And he began to laugh again and this time Gretna joined him. She shook her head and looked out toward the yard.

"I must have been some sight all sprawled out like a turkey waiting to get stuffed! Dear Lord what an awful thing that was."

They began to talk and filled in the blanks in each others stories. They told the simple stories people tell when they meet. The easy stories that don't hurt. The stories that require little effort to bring up. They eased into the cold waters of their histories, each knowing the other had deep scars and long journeys that led to this little moment in a kitchen. A red bird landed on the new rail Roscoe built to replace the one Gretna fell through. It lit there for a moment outside the open window and twitched its head from side to side. They noticed the bird in unison and smiled as is flew off in a dart. 

W.B.Z.N.

For The Love Of You

FOURTEEN

Kerry fussed with little picture frames on the table. She looked at herself in the mirror and rolled her lips together so the color was even. She lit two candles and opened a window. She had put an Isley Brothers record on the turntable. It was the last record she could remember her mother playing before they gave up on her father coming home. Since then the music stopped, the light couldn't penetrate the curtains and laughter left this room never to return. The walls were decorated with photos from Gretna's past, intermingled with photos of Kerry, her children and one photo in the back of the father of her boys.

"A house with no fathers." She said to herself.

The walls had been painted a mint green and Roscoe helped her put new fabric on the old couch.  She liked the old kitchen counters and they cleaned up nice. Despite the burnt circle in the center (Kerry called the tattoo) it was still in good shape and the old maple had a deep honey color. The cabinets looked better after Roscoe put new hinges and hardware on them and they worked fine. She was afraid to make too many changes for fear of overwhelming Gretna. She made all her decorating decisions based on memories of happier times and how it looked in her mind. Kerry paid for the gravel drive and most of the material's with the money Roscoe gave her for that old Bus. She gave up her rented house and moved here with the boys. Her mother was going to need help and Kerry held out her last scrap of hope that this was the one chance had at being a family. The grass was starting to come in and the tress and bushes were all trimmed back and manicured. The front of the house stood proud and painted against all the heartache it had held behind the walls inside. The walls of wood and plaster sealed in trauma that never aged, healed or lost its energy to torment the holder of the memories.

She wished Roscoe was there but he had decided to be absent for Gretna's first day. How could anyone do so much good and not want to see the moment when the gratitude came? He was always there working on this or that in the morning and he hummed old songs while he worked. Every three days or so he would ask Kerry if he was in the way, or if she minded him coming the next day. Kerry would laugh and tell him she hoped he would. They made little decisions based on paint they found or the old wheel barrel they turned into a planter. Even the old mangy dog had recovered at the hands of Roscoe. He sat for his first bath without struggle and looked up as Roscoe sang to him and poured water from an old cup. He trusted Roscoe and followed him around the property, always staying within petting distance of his savior.

Kerry took a Lexipro pill from the bottle she found on a table at Cabo's. She was in dire need the day she found prescription bottle, with the name scratched off. She thought it was that guy that ate alone all the time. The band guy that never said anything except what he wanted to eat. He always seemed to be watching people in the place, or surfing on the TVs. He wrote in a blue note book and tipped well. He always came early and usually left in a half hour. The same guy from the hospital. He was funny sometimes too, but mostly he just sat and ate. She found a note by the bottle:

"I heard you say you needed these. I do not take them anymore. I hope they help."

The note was written neatly on a napkin in all capital letters. There were fifty pills in the bottle enough to last her for almost three months. The label had the presciption number scratched off but the dosage and drug name were still there, as if to put her at ease they were safe.

"For The Love Of You" came on the stereo, and Kerry fell back into the old couch. Why couldn't she ever get over anything? She still missed him after all these years. She still felt the cold chill run down her stomach when she saw her boys watching other kids with their Dads. She had moments of pause where the burden left her, but then a song, smell, or distant memory would hit her and the great weight returned again. She danced with him in her mind, in that little house, before he left, before the plane went down, before the light went out inside her. There was a part of her that never wanted the sadness to abate. The aching was the shadow of her old love and she didn't want to let go of the dark outline of what she once had. It was the last silhouette of him, and she held vigil in private silence. It was a haven and a prison she retreated to, as a way to hang onto the last of him. She wondered if it was killing her in little pieces, and if she might fade away entirely.

She heard the gravel crunching under the tires, and saw the van from the hospital. She lifted the needle and moved it back to the beginning. She scanned the room, and hung the dish towel over the sink. She was moving forward, and she hoped maybe Gretna would too.


W.B.Z.N.

Sara

I am standing in a freaky little music store south of town. The owner is a really mellow guy. I have bought a few used things from him. We are comparing notes on who he knows and who I know. I tell him my name and his face completely changes to a knowing look. This is going to one of two ways: He is about to recount a first or second hand horror story about me being a colossal asshole or he is about to tell me that he has seen me play many times. Both results are bad for me because I hate compliments as much as I hate to apologize. My only hope is that he backs out of both and moves forward. Either way this will end with me tearing the scab off of something that I don't want to relive. He just says "Ya I know who you are" and moves past it. I mention that I played with Sara and he interrupts me mid sentence.

"Ya, what a nightmare her life has turned into. The bad habits have really taken their tole."

Her band was the first I ever played with in Tallahassee. I moved here to replace her drummer. Three sheets into the last set they called me up to play a song. I did everything wrong, overplayed, played too loud and completely blew it. My brother had been bragging about me for weeks, it was a disaster. The walk from the stage back to my seat was the longest of my life. I wobbled in my chair literally out of my body in a state of total embarrassment. The room was swirling around me. I was afraid to get eye contact with anyone. I tried to disappear and stay perfectly still hoping I would fade into the smoke and mold of that room, until no one could see me anymore.

The band starts a song with a two guitar intro. The keys swell a little in the back round and she starts to sing.

"Wait a minute baby.
 Stay with me a while
You said you'd give me life
but you never told me bout the fire... "

The band comes in and she is lost in the song. This is not the standard covers she has been playing all night and for the first time I forget myself. She is looking at me and I can't look away. I am not a band guy anymore, I am outside the circle, I am a fan.

I never joined that version of her band, but later we played together many times in three different bands. She became this fixture in my life. It was the gig I could always do, whenever I wanted. At one of my lowest moments, after a band break up, I wondered into that club and she asked me to do a tour of military bases in Europe. I never considered anything involved, I said yes and we left. Later we toured Japan, and played clubs all over North Florida. Every time one of my bands broke apart, I fell back to her to be rebuilt. As soon as I had my legs under me, I left to start another band, or manage bands, or get married, or whatever I needed.

Years later, with my band at The Cab Stand she wandered in and I called her up. It was packed and my guitar player started the opening riff to the song she hooked me with years earlier. The energy in that room changed immediately. People turned away from the bar, the football on T.V. from everything they were doing. She winked at me and reached down to take my beer from the edge of the drum riser. She had a voice that was louder that the P.A. but in this song she was just moving air and notes with economic skill. She was a real singer, a pro.

There are moments that stand in a place in your mind forever. Those little snaps shots of the things that are the best of what anyone can be. It's a slow motion, frame by frame that you will carry forever. You realize a picture has been painted in your mind. Time slows down and you watch the moments like a movie. It is the highlight reel of that person that you watch over and over after you lose them. It is a marker for a time in your life you will never get back. It is etched in smoke and a song you can't listen to without crying, or bear to turn off. It is the sweet pain reserved for the great people in your life, and times that can never be retrieved. This will be the best memory I have of her.

"And it was just like a great dark wind
Within the wings of a storm.
I think I had met my match....."


I can hear her singing that line. A line she sang a thousand times, for the first time, every time she sang it. She truly had drowned in the sea of love. Love of music, the wrong men and a dream that never came true.

" Ya man she showed up for a gig covered in bruises.  She was at that point ya know? Just ugly wasted."

I can't believe it. I never saw her do drugs. I tell the guy this and he just laughs. He is not without compassion, he takes no pleasure from it, but he reports like he's reading the news. Like it is someone I don't know.

I have memories of her turning around to look at me a thousand times when we were locked in some harmony together. I remember her silhouette in blue lights singing about the poet in her heart. I remember her singing to hundreds of young soldiers in Okinawa. They swayed to her voice and held out their hands to her, like she was the greatest singer in the world. The next day they shipped out to Iraq,  to what they thought was certain death. I remember her rendering a room catatonic, after singing a song she wrote about her boyfriend. The one that grabbed onto her and strangled her last chance to become a recording artist. He held onto her as his last desperate attempt to the big time. He never let her up until the dreams were dead and gone. When he released her, she drifted from one train wreck to the next, looking for an overhang in the storm.

Sometimes when we had too much to drink she looked as if she was trying to say something. She would sing a lyric and glance at me out of the side of her eyes, to see if was watching her. She was the only woman I was ever in a band with. She used to look at me like I could save her, but I needed someone to save me. When I found that woman, I married her. Sara never crossed a single line, but a question hung out there in a space between us, like a cloud too heavy to rain.

I played with her a few years ago after I quit managing. I was lost again, and she called me to do some gigs. I wasn't sure I could even play. It had been six years since I set foot on a stage. She rebuilt me as a musician, like she had so many times before. Her old boyfriend was the guitar player. He was married to a lawyer, repeating his life long pattern of finding a woman to fill the gaps in his life. It was a sad, drunk band, that had too few magic moments in the set list for me to bear. So I left her like I had so many times before. I left her to languish in that mire she could never break away from. I didn't want to believe that it was all I had left. I didn't want to be like them. I told her I couldn't do it anymore, on the phone one day, in traffic.

The music store guy is still talking, but I am swirling in that chair back in 1987. I am drunk on memories and drowning in guilt. I hear her singing "Sara" the song that  shares her name and my memory of her forever. I am afraid this will end like many other stories I have known from the old days. With a bad ceremony, people that don't know when to leave the podium and some singer, seizing the moment to be the center of attention. Graveyards across America are riddled with the awful stones, with musical notes, guitars, and drums carved on them. These are the sad testimonials to the souls that dreamed of fame and found only demons they couldn't shake.

I am trying to find my way back to something. It is so late in my game to stage a rally. Denial is a powerful drug I have mainlined and recovered from, a hundred times. How can I nail this latest saga to my cross? Sara is another sin I will have to atone for. I fell on her when I didn't feel good about myself. I would go play with her to feel like a hero in the small pond. As soon as my ego was charged, I'd walk away and leave them there in the lounge of the damned, playing for corpses that didn't know they were dead. That bar is closed now, and the inhabitants are scattered to the winds. I couldn't save her and I still can't. I can't save anyone. I am hanging by psychological threads like everyone else. I sit in restaurants eating alone. I have a home and family I can go back to when I am done slumming and watching other peoples stories. I have this blog where I glorify it all. She has a broken heart and a voice I will never forget.

She is out there somewhere, playing gigs with bruises, just outside the edge of who I could let into my circle of love.

"There was a heartbeat and it never really died,
Yes it never really died."

W.B.Z.N.

Souvenirs

Twelve 

Roscoe moved up in line to the bank teller, and he rattled the withdrawal slip in his hand. The teller did not regard him until she saw his name on the paper. Her posture changed from the tired Monday morning employee to the snapped attention of a soldier. Roscoe slid the slip to her and tapped her hand gently.

"I have no need for a manager, it is just a small transaction."

He smiled at her and she looked back at him with the face of a subordinate that had to follow protocol. 

"If you have to go get him, it's okay."

The teller waddled off and got the manager. Roscoe watched them talk behind the glass walls. He wondered what these people did in those offices. Suddenly the whole bank was a buzz with the news that he was there. He had not been there in so long that he wondered if any of them had ever seen him in the flesh. Surely he had been the subject of a meeting or two. They were always trying to set him up appointments with investment bankers and financial planners. That made him laugh, if they were so smart with money, why did they need to mess around with his?

"Hello Mr...."

Roscoe interrupted the manager and smiled disarmingly.

"Please, don't make a fuss. I just need to make a withdrawal. I don't want all this attention. You are doing a fine job, I am happy with the bank."

He looked down into his hat unable to stop the flow of emotion. He didn't deserve this attention. He hated that feeling of tears forming. He was so familiar with their arrival and yet every time they came he was surprised and nervous. He hated being treated like a man that was important. He was rich quite literally by accident, the one that took his Lilly from him. He felt a single tear break away and run down his face.

"Would it be possible for you to put into that file of mine, that I do NOT want to meet the manger every time I make a transaction? I just want to withdraw a few dollars. You have my withdrawal slip. Here is my license. Please, (his hand was shaking as he held out his license) just let me come and go like anyone else."

The manager was now flustered and Roscoe felt the inevitable twinge of guilt. He hated any confrontation. He hated to be singled out. He loved more than anything to not be noticed at all, to live within his thoughts and to pass the time. He only enjoyed talking to people that knew nothing of him. To be mistaken as just another man was his life's greatest ambition, but there would be none of that today.

Roscoe hit the stack of bills sideways on the counter with a crack and turned to leave. As he walked to the door he tried to force the bills into his money clip and it broke in two. The money cascaded out of his hands and fell like leaves to the floor. He knelt down and began grasping at the bills and the broken pieces of the his favorite souvenir. He looked at the hand painted mountain scene from Germany and the piece of the broken gold clip. He let out a stifled groan as he stuffed the wreckage of the bills and broken pieces of clip into his pocket. He shuffled out of the bank in an embarrassed rush, lost his balance on the curb and fell to the ground. He caught himself on one knee and his right hand. He slowly rose again and staggered toward the car. He started his car and reached for the ivory gear shift knob. He paused and looked at the picture on the money clip again. The tears fell out of his eyes now and rolled off the wool of his coat. The tellers and the manager watched from he window of the bank and Roscoe felt like an animal in a zoo. He was an oddity and had been since the moment his Lilly left this earth. He was a living ghost that his God had condemned to wander among the living. He could not die and to live was a Herculean struggle. He tried everyday to keep moving, to help people, and to build things, because Lilly would be mad with him for giving up. He knew living alone was the price he paid for his sins. He tried to put the pieces of the clip together in a desperate exercise of denial, hoping some miracle would mend the one keepsake he cherished above all others. He gently put the pieces into his breast pocket and eased out of his space until he heard the honk of a horn. He was startled and scared and just wanted to get away. The angry driver yelled something as he eased his old bug out into the impossible traffic on North Monroe Street. He back tracked through the neighborhoods to Miccosukee Road. Passing under I-10 far from town, he finally started to feel at peace. He and this old car were not meant for these hurried times. They were built for slow country roads and trips with out time limits.

He pulled through his gate and got out to lock it. It was already cold and the seasons first hard freeze was rolling in with the setting sun. He locked the gate and looked out over the grass towards the tree line. God, she loved the sunsets. Lilly would have made him wait till the sun was down. She would have made him shut the car off and look. She would have held his hand and looked at the sky and he would have watched her instead. He loved the way she captured special moments. She never let him forget the beauty of this life. She taught him how to notice things and how to slow down. She left him with a gift he could never forget and now every sunset or flower or first cold wind of the season, was a melody that sang her name. She was everywhere he looked and he could not spend one moment of life without thoughts of her and what she would say about everything in his sight. Sometimes he would hear a distant noise in the house and for a split second (before he remembered she was gone) he would get a respite of relief. Other times, when he was watching TV or laying in bed, he would smell the faint hint rose water. He would close his eyes and not move. The aroma of her perfume would waft over him, slowly fading back into the coldness of being alone. It was in these solitary mirages, that he felt her gently leading him forward, like a light on the horizon.

 It took a long time to get the fire going and by the time he had heated the stew and made it to his chair, he was tired. He poured a tall glass of wine and sat down in his chair to watch the flames and eat. He had one of those music stations playing from the satellite dish. He finished eating and sat there drinking for a long time. Percy Sledge came out of the speakers and he was transported back to the day she gave him the money clip. They were in Germany in a small hotel by Lake Konigsee. The money clip had Watzmann Mountain painted on it. It had been a month since he bought that little car and they had been meandering from one town to the next. Someone would tell them that they had to see a village or a mountain and off they would go to find it.

Lilly climbed into the car and clasped her hands together which was a clue for Roscoe to pick a hand. He tapped her right one and she giggled and turned it over to reveal the gift.

"Now you will never forget our visit here or last night!"

He put his hand on her leg and slid up her skirt. The pattern of her stockings rippled under his fingers and he moved the fabric just high enough to see the beginning of her underwear. She looked around and then back at Roscoe. She put her hand on top of his and she watched his face as he looked down. He adored every inch of her and she loved to see the wonder in his eyes when he looked at her. She leaned in and kissed him. He held her face and then let his hand drift down to her coat. He slid an index finger in between the fabric and moved it away so he could see inside her shirt. He was addicted to her and helpless. He was unable to be aware of anything except the thought of her skin and her body. It was if they had just made love seconds ago and the memory of being tangled together possessed him. He could not think of anything else but the hidden parts of her. It was as if he knew a secret about her and the person she was when she was naked. He wanted to trigger the other woman that lived inside her. He needed nothing, not sleep, food or air. He only needed to be inside her again and enough light from the fire to reveal the magic of her. He strained to remember every curve and texture of her. She moved in closer to him and breathed in his ear. She held his hand tighter and neither one of them wanted to move, ever again. They wanted to stay in this blind haze of love forever.

"There are no more rooms here and we have four hours of mountain roads in between us and Austria. Why do you torture me? Please Roscoe, you have to stop. You are making me crazy, we have to drive. Please baby. You know its too bad we don't have one of those vans. We could pull over anywhere we wanted, draw the curtains and put out the fire. But you bought this bug and it is ALL your fault."
Lilly teased him and giggled, but she never pushed him away.

He leaned away and looked at her again, suddenly aware they were in a small gravel parking lot. They laughed and held onto each other. No one had ever wanted him like she did. He never knew he could make a woman feel the way he made her feel. He never felt like he was trying anything with her. She wanted his hands on her, like he was the answer to all her dreams. He felt pure and safe for the first time in his life. He looked out the window and then back at the money clip. He put his cash in there and realized he would remember this moment, and how he loved her for the rest of his life. He started the car and headed up the long Bavarian road out of the valley. He could smell the rose water and hear the gravel crumbling under the tires.

The fire crackled as Roscoe's hand let go of the wine glass and he gave in to sleep. The TV tray swayed slightly under the weight of his arm. The last few red drops eased out and rolled over the clip and the three thousand dollars. It stained the bills and the painted mountain scene, finally forming a puddle by his wrist.

"Lilly."

Roscoe mumbled in a whisper.

"I love you Lilly.......Lilly...."

Roscoe drifted off to sleep. He was in Germany. It was a beautiful day for a drive to Austria with his Lilly.

W.B.Z.N.
     

The Beacon

Eleven

The overcast sky hides the cold, miles behind its curtain. He is late again. He stayed up deep into the night making notes, and clocking song tempos. He stays in his lane and watches the frantic behavior among the flow, that actually care they are late. They can't keep their cars in their lane, they can't decide to take the short cut. They spin their heads, brake erratically and transmit their bad energy from car to car slowly infecting the traffic.

A few lifetimes ago, this was surf season. The dark skies marked the return of the fall swells, the south running mackerel, the Blacktips that chased them, and stiff north east winds. With a leg up on the dash, he would steer the horizontal wheel of his V.W. bus one handed. He twisted down Indian River Drive past the second rate aristocracy of Ft. Pierce. The (old money) Spanish style houses watched the river, smelled the putrid low tide, and tried to convince themselves they were still royals. Each iron gated mansion, hid empty servants houses and the owners dark dreams to fill them with someone to lord over. He rarely looked at the houses instead trying to read the river for clues of the wind and tide. He would surf before work at North Jetty Surf Shop, hanging T-shirts and selling beach clothes to rich northern ladies. All he ever thought about was getting out, and escaping that town. It was proof that even when he was young he was never content. It was not a symptom of age and loss, it was a congenital flaw he carried from birth, like the hole in the atrium of his heart.

He rolls into the parking lot and scores a space up front. It was twenty five years ago, when he left in the middle of the night and came to Tallahassee. He enrolled in T.C.C. met a guitar player, formed a band and dropped out after two semesters. It was all just a blur of gigs, bands, jobs, marriage and kids. He opens the door to his office, just like he had every day for fifteen years. Dark grey cement block walls and a computer await in the converted storage closet. From this desk he has edited hundreds of legal seminars. This job has been base camp to all that was good in this life. A family, health coverage, a steady check and a two hundred dollar Christmas bonus each year. This little closet office with two windows, allowed him to manage bands, ride bikes, and to show up an hour late once in a while. He wondered if he would ever leave this place. He wondered if some part of him was in this room forever like some residual ghost, stuck in an endless loop on security footage. He drinks hot tea with sugar and no milk, it is awful. He looks through tiny slits in the Venusian blinds. Leaves break loose of their moorings and acorns bounce off of cars like ping pong balls.

It was all bearable now that he had a gig. He could push the rock up  hill again. The carrot (however impossible) was on the stick. The new bands first gig went well and the songs were good. They would be in the studio with a producer again. He would be playing drums and singing. He would not be coaching hungover, tattooed, punks. He would be in the booth, playing for the first time in twelve years. He would be safe in the place where he knew how to behave. Hope is the light that feeds the soul, and he hadn't felt like this in years. If it was all a delusion, and came crashing down like rain, he would take it. There is always time for regret and tears, but hope was a jewel in the maze. He wanted to bathe in it, to roll it around in his mouth, he wanted to remember every second. He wanted to move slowly and paint the cave walls in his mind with these feelings he never thought he'd have again.

Two months ago it was all a conversation about something that might happen. Now there were 18 songs, a producer, and a reserved studio. It all seemed funny, but he dared not analyze it for fear of loosing the beacon. He focused and took a moment to remember the hope of having a chance. He counted down the minutes to lunch and a trip to Cabo's.

W.B.Z.N.
 

Pictures

*Ten*




Gretna woke up At 1:05 pm. She looked at the over cast sky and wondered for the first time in ages what it would be like to be out in the air. She was on the sixth floor and the cars scurried about completely unaware she was watching. Physical therapy had been hard that day but the good news was, she would be going home soon. Who would have thought that she would look forward to being on crutches? A tiny bird landed on the window sill and darted it's head back and forth. It's back and feathers were gray and it had a burnt orange breast. She gasped and held her breath, surprised by the sight of it. She watched him there for a while and he flitted off again. The mundane things she took for granted seemed like magic. She had been on the other side of a dark window long enough.

There was a photo album, some flowers and a card on the rolling tray next to her bed. It had a denim cover with little cloth flowers sewn into it. She let her hands drift over the book. She opened the first pages and saw the desert pictures from their last day together. She was wearing leather Indian boots that came up to her knee and a mini skirt she had made out of an old pair of jeans. She had on a small jacket she found in a Salvation Army store. One button at the bottom was fastened and the jacket puckered just a little to betray the skin beneath. Her chiffon scarf hovered in the air pulling away from her in taught waves. Her hair blew over her face and into her mouth and she was looking at Joey with awe and love oblivious to the camera. The shutter snapped and she was suspended there in the wind at sunset. He made her feel so pretty. She had confidence back then. How could she loose something as simple as a feeling, or a posture? She lost those things, along with her faith and the belief that he would come home. There was always one more day between calls, letters and checks. The time stretched out between them and she lost hope that things could ever be what she had hoped. She could never shake the feeling that she was his girl. Some part of her believed he would just appear on her doorstep, and they would remember they had a love that could weather anything. She played the scenario out a million times in her mind. He was the mirage she followed into sleep every night.

She used to carry a small camera and she took pictures when he wasn't looking. She took a picture of him waving from a train station in Flagstaff. He had been offered a job by someone they met at a campground. She would drive back to Tallahassee and he would send money. She took a picture of him there, waving and smiling with a single leather bag slung over his shoulder. His hand was on the heart of his jean jacket. She remembered every patch she sewed on that jacket. She remembered every time she rested her head against that coat. The Jackson Brown eight track was playing in the deck he put in the glove box of her V.W. bus. As she took the picture "My Opening Farewell" played. She never thought for a minute she would never see him again. She was so deeply in love, it never occurred to her that things could slip away so easily. She didn't know that everything in the world hung by tender threads. At that moment everything was fine. She watched him go through the big wooden doors. She pulled out of the station and headed down interstate forty. It was the beginning of her new life. In seven months she would have a baby.

"Hello miss Gretna." The nurse walked in carrying her chart and the Doctor followed.

"Well we are going to have to kick you out of here next week. All we have to do is take out the rods and screews. You still have a long road back to being your old self, but it looks good."

"Your old self." It hung there in the air like some challenge from the doctor. She hadn't had a drink or a cigarette in weeks. She had lost twenty pounds. Her color had changed, her thinking had changed and she only coughed a little in the mornings. She had spoken with a dietitian. She remembered being a vegetarian when she was young. She remembered music she used to like. She remembered what it felt like to not to be dying one minute at a time. It was funny how physical pain made her forget the fears she'd been hiding from. She even dreamed again while she slept. It had been years since that happened. Gretna's eyes welled up and she turned away to recover. There were the pictures she took of Kerry. She was such a beautiful little girl. The last pictures in the album were new photos of her house. The new porch, the cleaned living room and kitchen looked like something from an impossible dream. There were plants in the yard and that damn stray dog was on the porch looking healthy and clean. The last picture was of the black man that found her the day she was hurt. He was leaning on a saw horse in overalls. He had a handkerchief in the other hand. He was smiling. The caption below it read:

"Mr. Roscoe has been working on your house Momma. He is an angel. The house will be ready for you next week."

Gretna put the album down where she could see it. She left it open on the pictures of the house. She felt that feeling you get after Christmas. That feeling of being excited about having something new, that you had always wanted. She pulled the nicotine patch off her arm, and fell off into a deep sleep.

She was driving that old bus in the desert. She felt young again, it was a crisp early day. Jackson Brown was singing to her again about Arizona. It was just past sun up and there was no one on the road but her.


W.B.Z.N.