Rewriting Stella

by Tuttle, Dan;

to earth, be charred by fire, and sprout themselves.

  With worlds enough and time, this dullest brown

  compacted seed grenade makes stuff of elves

  and ents and trolls and fantasies come real:

  the forests of Red Riding Hood, the Shire,

  or Narnia. In hindsight, tree revealed

  the way that Stella’d move to reacquire

  identity aligned with goals. “Hey, Stel!”

  came distant wheezy shout. Ha! Cade, too, fell,

  266.

  she thought. Sound helped her right herself and scan

  forbidden woodlands for some Day-Glo print

  of gold and crimson. Far down slope a man

  made an involuntary encampment

  with flung possessions spread like glitterbomb

  as if to mark the territory. Cade’s

  fall had been breathtaking, and bitter. Palm

  to snow, Stel stood up, starting small cascades

  of powder, weight of power. She steadied, swerved

  her weight to right foot, leaned, and glided like

  she hadn’t moment past been tad unnerved.

  Traversing slope akin to the Klondike,

  she focused: body’s aches took second slot

  till she could get a closer-up snapshot

  267.

  of if he was okay. She neared and picked

  left mitten jutting from the snow, still ten

  yards from his body. “Stella, I predict

  you’ll find a hand-knit scarf there too,” and then

  she did, and held it up. “Okay. See chains?”

  “What chains?” “My bling.” “What color?” “Are you blind?

  I wear gold everyday, bling brings the rains!”

  Stel figured humor probably entwined

  with health, so nothing’s broken. Then they’d won!

  A little excavation brought delight

  when gold shined through the powdered water, sun

  reflecting its own hue in chainlink. “Rite

  of passage, acrobatics on the board.”

  “You spaced and tried a kickflip?” Quip ignored,

  268.

  Cade flailed his arms like mightiest T-Rex

  and showed his dino strength: “I’m buried here,

  ten years to life. Need bail.” Indeed, prospects

  for digging himself out looked fairly mere.

  Stel gave him back his garments and his charm

  and from her knees pushed loose the weight of snow.

  It felt like wartime rescue of gendarme,

  her soldier’s duty ex officio.

  Unburied after two short breaks, equipped

  again with proper trappings for the cold,

  they stood, and hoped the slope was nondescript

  from there to base—or if not, then patrolled.

  With granted wish, they carved down to the root

  of profuse range without a parachute.

  269.

  “Whoa, Cade,” said Stel, Keanu Reeves-intoned,

  “that’s gnarly gnar right there.” She panted, breath

  all visible. “Don’t know who chaperoned

  whom down the mountain this time. Cheating death

  is special kind of thrill, you’d say?” Stel felt

  like it was similar to cheating past,

  but didn’t want to talk about it. “Welts?”

  “Not one,” he said. They laid as angels, gassed

  in snow. The clouds rolled by, the air was thick—

  or, thicker than at peak, and difference sensed.

  “If you could redo life, what would you pick?”

  asked Stel of Cade, both prostrate, undefensed.

  “Nobody’s ever asked me that,” in tone

  of Genie came reply, “I wish I’d known

  270.

  that there’s no race, no competition, zilch

  defining us externally. It’s us.

  In ways, I feel like grades just serve to filch

  all our attentions when we’re young. The fuss

  amounts to roughly nothing over years.

  Some classmates graded highly ain’t done jack,

  some classmates dropping out have bank careers.

  I didn’t view myself as quarterback

  until I started listening to rap.

  Your hustle dominates your GPA.

  If I ran course again, from that first lap,

  I’d say, ‘self, you a G’ then go be a

  right proper hustler, day one, no holds barred.

  I walked too long down others’ boulevards.

  271.

  And you?” he quickly asked. Attention shift

  was noticed by them both. “My history.

  No, my mythology,” she said, then riffed

  a short time more, then said, “It’s blistering

  and getting even colder. Let’s go in.”

  In pine trunk skiing lodge pretending to

  be paying guests, they scooped from cocoa tin

  and brewed up balmy beverage blending two

  parts milk to water, sugaring to taste,

  which wasn’t much when dominating thirst

  was reason for the mug in the first place.

  It also pleased their hands, and so they nursed.

  The fireplace opened fires in places closed

  a long time back, where kindling’d been exposed.

  272.

  “Mythology,” reciprocated Cade,

  “Before I close my eyes I fantasize

  I’m livin’ well,” staccato serenade

  came from him, “when I wake and realize

  I’m just a prisoner in hell. That’s Pac,

  in ‘Outlaw’, first song that I memorized.

  He rapped about the dissonance of Glock

  with loyalty and love, with them-or-I’s.

  You’ll learn a thing about mythology

  by giving it a listen, ’95,

  on Me Against The World. It’s gotta be

  a classic on what we become, deprived

  of all the civilizing things we claim

  society and urban life became.”

  273.

  The chocolate’s richness fit the lodge decor.

  It and the fire breathed life back in them both.

  That life took form of words, and Cade said more

  with distant look in eye. “And now I quoth:

  What I say might save a life, what I speak

  might save the street, ain’t got no instruments,

  (it’s Killer Mike) I got my hands and feet.

  I heard in 2012, and in some sense

  it let me change what’s me.” “What do you mean?”

  “Did Auntie Tao say much about me when

  she fixed your visa?” “No, I knew she’d screen

  whoever I’d be staying with, her ken

  for people’s always good. I trusted.” “It’s

  not safety, it’s that my whole life omits

  274.

  the need for any explanation. She

  said nothing of her second-cousin Cade

  because his dazzling personality

  was two shades of a good accountant’s: grayed,

  and bland. I didn’t know a thing beyond

  the textbooks and the weekend classes dad

  forced me to focus on. He had me conned

  in hope I’d be tracked to Olympiad

  in one of them. In honesty, I sucked.

  I slogged because it’s only thing I knew.

  Nobody took one sec to deconstruct

  that all I ever did was overdo—

  and, being stretched, had expertise in none.

  How’s that for formula to wake your son?”

  275.

  He paused and sipped and stared into the fire.

  “That song goes on, says that it’s gospel, soul,

  funk, jazz and even church, from pew to choir

  at pulp
it, players Pentecostal, goal

  to preach the opposite of pop bullshit.

  I liked it, liked that he put self square at

  the target’s center in a mouthful. It

  was new to me, this way he pushed prayer that

  the audience get woke in narrative.

  Words put in wind come back like boomerang,

  he said, with microphone, declarative.

  He pointed it at crowd, they heard, they sang.

  Just one song, Stel. I listened fifty times

  and realized much more than nifty rhymes.”

  276.

  “But that was 2012. You mean to say

  the Cade I know’s a reinvention?” “Sure.

  Who isn’t, Stella? Everybody’s clay,

  just some know that they’ve molding hands. Uncured,

  we’re pliable. There’s boatloads of pop psych

  attesting so. The problem’s that folks fire

  their clay in kiln because they rather like

  themselves, get bored, get lazy, or get mired

  in something, then they switch to stories of

  their self as fixed, unchanging. I grew with

  a story that was wrong, matured, then shoved

  it back to history, replaced the myth

  with something better suiting of the grind

  that’s more nutritional for hungry mind.”

  277.

  The cocoa’d cooled to fancy chocolate milk,

  depending how you saw it. Toes were dry.

  Lodge rental desk continued plan to bilk

  day-trippers of deposits on supplies.

  No busy bodies busybodied two

  who sat contemplatively near the heat.

  They couldn’t. Stories disembodied glued

  them both together under each heartbeat.

  “My legs are getting stiff, I guess it’s time

  to waddle back.” “Think we’re too late for spa?”

  “Now knowing you, if so, I think you’ll climb

  into the bathtub, fill it up, and—” “Ha!

  Baths ain’t the same without the jets, sis. ’Ye

  would never take a bath that’s just halfway.”

  CHAPTER 27

  278.

  They walked through door an artisan had carved

  to get back home to weekend rental where

  full tree logs made the walls feel more enlarged,

  as if the earth itself planned out the lair.

  “A tundra Shire,” Stel mused, and bounced to Cade.

  “Yeah, less the rings and drama. And the orcs.”

  Though landlord had explicitly forbade

  all parties, they prepared to pop some corks.

  Their muscles in recuperative mode,

  they quickly changed to swimsuits, brought fresh booze

  and went to patio. Tub-goers glowed

  appreciatively for the session brews.

  Such gifts distributed, with words to greet,

  they fell to chit-chat once they took their seat.

  279.

  “Oh, Stella! Saw those literary treats,”

  bikini-clad, immersed-in-tub Dar said,

  “you’re such a modern William Butler Yeats

  on Instagram! A repost to my thread

  on Facebook got a hundred likes.” “By whom?”

  “I can’t keep track of individuals

  these days, folks skip creating to consume.”

  “On social?” “Yep. These posts and vids viewed fill

  lost sense of self with betters: us.” Stel asked

  with no detected false camaraderie

  how Dar’d become so skilled to have amassed

  so many followers. Gam? Flock? Herd? Siege?

  What could such groups of animals be called

  when far too numerous to be recalled?

  280.

  Not needing ’nother nudge toward monologue,

  Dar started in on juicy gossiping—

  or so her tone inflected. Stel agog,

  Dar leaned in, shared her secret sauce, tipping

  her hand on every recipe she used.

  She loved to be the expert. When her fans

  in real life recognized her, and then schmoozed

  she’d cancel what she had as other plans

  to talk to them at length. To Stel’s delight,

  compatriots had tuned out and weighed the

  case for, against, the MVP they’d knight

  that season: Westbrook, Harden, or KD.

  Stel figured watching NBA’d be fun,

  but just for rest once coup d’etat was done.

  281.

  “You follow others?” Stel repeated back,

  to memorize the early steps Dar said

  paved way for some reciprocation, hacked

  the altruism others claimed was dead

  on world wide web. “Oh yes, and comment, too.

  The more that you engage, the better your

  small chance is that the web-linked content you

  put in is read. Treat each as letter for

  the person whose attention you’re to catch.”

  Stel must admit that Darla had her flaws,

  but also that she’d guilt not having patched

  into this expertise. Conceit withdraws

  the curiosities of audience:

  Stel’d overdosed on Darla’s gaudiness.

  282.

  “It’s cold, it’s snowing, and you lack a drink

  to warm you up! I’ll fetch another Spritz

  for you,” said Stella, gaining time to think

  and write down all she’d learned in shorthand chits

  on Post-It notes in kitchen drawer. She mixed

  prosecco with some Aperol and ice,

  took out a lemon, sliced it, and then fixed

  it to flute rim. Feigned servitude was price

  to get the shortlist of the things to do

  to dominate all social media,

  from Dar, the opposite of ingénue.

  Stel’d choke it down to learn how speeding the

  switch from Tee to her could go feasibly:

  craft content taken nigh-believably.

  283.

  That ‘nigh’, that close-enough, gave benefit

  of doubt in Darla’s view. Her average fan

  tuned in in wistfulness he’d turnabout

  from bore to Bond somehow in mere short span

  of YouTube clip. Proximity to greats,

  Stel thought without so telling Dar, was cause

  for every human striving since we’d apes

  as parents. Broadcast how self wished-for was.

  Produce the self on hero’s arc, elude

  the probing questions of the riffraff plebes:

  your narrative itself would then intrude

  their psyche, and then even if half leaves

  they’re left with the impression you’re no peer

  and grant subconscious halo you’re premier.

  284.

  “At home,” Abu began, “I’m one of eight.

  We once lived well in Syria, till war

  broke out in Lebanon, and our estate

  became a looters’ target, laws ignored.

  They ousted us from title to the land,

  we fled to Turkey. Left in foreignness,

  jobs, food, and shelter scarce, we’d not withstand

  for long. So we came here. Now sore in this

  is me, forgotten as my family copes

  by squatting on some land and planting crops.”

  Stel felt familiarities evoked

  in lamentation life’s but farming ops.

  “My parents told of past, but still remained

  attached to story royalty’s ingrained.”

  285.

  The solid patio, a wooden deck

  beneath the soles felt nearly stable as

  the ground itself, an artificial tech

  a
ge-old to fool the feet with fable. Has

  the moon scared off the clouds? Yes. Han-loom fan

  I’ve looked to from all over Earth… Stel mused

  toward end of night electric. It began

  that way, at least, then somehow blew a fuse.

  Some friends went off to privately do drugs,

  some others had too much to drink, some more

  expressed a need to get down, cut some rugs,

  before their bodies told them they were sore.

  And so like bulbs without electrons cool,

  friends too turned off when left bereft of joules.

  286.

  That meant night’s twin headlights were moon and Stel,

  a treat worth savoring. She grabbed her pack

  of cyan Spirits, snuck out for a spell,

  and simply stood, appreciating black.

  Black. Black of night. The black that eyelids keep.

  The black of back of mind. The black of space.

  The black unconscious passing-out of sleep.

  The black of holes. The black of things erased.

  Her lighter’s spark ignited all that thought

  flash paper-like, as retinas reset.

  It’s funny, how a tiny little dot

  of fire reduces rest to silhouette:

  near-literal case there of smoke and mirr’r

  (less verse reflective so to witness steer).

  287.

  Door clicked. “You mind?” asked Joe with deference

  that sounded genuine. She offered him

  the pack in gesture of benevolence.

  “Thank god it’s not an EU pack. They’ve grim

  full-color photos of what cancer does.

  And, well, I’ll say it works ’cause just one look

  is all it took to kill my nicki buzz.

  Cold turkey quit for two years, then retook

  the nasty habit at my company.

  I couldn’t handle all the stress. The break

  was time to think. Whoa! These have pungency.”

  Joe breathed unfiltered air to cope. Both faked

  not being quite as cold as felt. “What brings

  you outside for a pause?” “Oh, you know… things.”

  288.

  Too dark to see if Joe had smiled or not,

  Stel found she didn’t really care to know.

  In silence they traced through the inky blot,

  searched stars for satellite or UFO.

  He turned a moment taciturn, time passed

  in space of simply silent being. Sky

  had steady, pushing breeze that could outlast

  the fragment clouds that tried to overfly.

  Some time an interval in future, length

  of cigarettes reduced to zero’s ash,

  Joe let his hair down, scrunchie’s tethered strength

  reduced to naught with no object to lash.

  “Mm. Things,” he said, “they’re one of my faves, too.”