Flee

by Evan Dara

  —And I—

  You know, I mean …

  Where does it go …?

  Is there enough room in the world for all the things that have been taken away from me—?

  —So why? Why now? Why would I, at this far-too-late point, ask the city to add my house to its caretaker program?

  I do not know. But I feel it will make me – what – part of something. The moth that is my center will finally find a landing. By upstaking, I will be returning to something, something within me, something valuable, vital and true. And, yes, I will be adding to something greater than I am. Something greater that knows of humility.

  I will hand my keys in on Church Street – City Hall. Then they will take over, keep my estate clean.

  It is not running away. It is running toward.

  And Carol: So Mr. Reiser, does that mean we can …?

  And Rick: Yes. Yes. Of course. I understand entirely.

  And Carol: Wonderful, Janie. Really great. So I can call you again next—

  —Extraordinary, there was no funeral. Or marker. Or ceremony. Or anything at all. I was just walking up Cherry Street this morning and oop. None of the lights are on. No carts rattlingly being pushed in, or out. There are four, five parking spaces available on the Street right in front. A stack of circulars still cinched together and lying at the front door. It had been such a big do. And now – nothing. SureAid gone. Dark and – gone.

  Like it never was there, except for all the ruin it did. Server of individuals, Hitler of businesses. All kinds of small shops kaput, in what: months? You try selling flipflops when you haven’t got a potato chip aisle. A tenth-rate DVD department. A prescription drug department.

  Just giving people what they want. Do they want no place to produce anything? No way to earn a coin to spend in your huge, hugely impressive mega-emporium?

  Hm. Currency …

  And, yes, I’ve heard the excuse, the mea-non-culpa, mis-quoted from last century and still just as persuasive: I was only filling orders …

  Sure, I went in. Bought a little plastic sleeve filled with magic markers in a rainbow of colors, when my son needed them for arts and crafts at school. It was convenient, it was right there and it was cheap. Also grabbed a bottle of Vitamin Ds while I was in there – why not. But I never went back. Until I had to, starting about six weeks ago. After which, SureAid had itself one hell of a good customer.

  And now – gone. It’ll probably kill us. My phone store, three doors down, I’ll never survive. I’ll never be able to get by just on incidental traffic, people who happen to be passing through town. Lower the rent all you want, Mayer & Co., then lower your expectations for ever seeing another centavo of it from me.

  So, the multiplier effect. The death of the slaughterer is going to slaughter—

  —

  —What’s surprising is … Well, it isn’t really surprising at all. Just look around. You can take your time walking down the sidewalks in city center. For the first time in I don’t know how long, you can amble. Waterfront Park is trimmed and beautiful. There’s much less general noise, and I’m sure there are fewer of those nasty old grey-green buses – good riddance! I totally sense the air downtown is cleaner. Certainly smells a lot better. Parking is a cinch. I just picked up two pounds of apples for a dollar forty- nine, and clothes and movies, forget that you never have to wait on line, they’re always on sale. Always. Six bucks for Reservation Road!

  And just you wait: there’s more. I got hired part-time at City Hall – they need people to do data entry – and I can tell you our figures say that thefts in stores are down. Way down. Also divorce. And teen pregnancy, and out-of-wedlock births. This, of course, is per capita, or however they measure earlier and now. And sometime not so long ago, someone saw a pair of Common Terns in Leddy Park. They said it had been years.

  —The End-of-Day’ers cluster near the back of C. Ruggles. Each holds a glass, or glass bottle, that borrows the bars muffled light, lends it inward to glaze the fuel for their Permanent Farewell Blast. At 7:15 p.m., the subject is retirement procedures for words that are out of work.

  Can’t just can em, Gustav says. I mean, they have to be prepared for what comes next. Educated in handling leisure time.

  Only right, Breece says. After all their years of service.

  Mm, says Marcus. What are ‘fairness’ and ‘predictable’ going to do, now that they’re no longer employable?

  Hm, says Breece. You think that pair’s related?

  Breece looks at the shooting gallery of bottles behind the bar. He and Gustav sip. Marcus looks across the motionless room.

  Maybe we take one of the tables?, Marcus then says.

  We’re good here, Gustav says.

  Breece nods.

  Marcus puts down his glass. You know how there’s this big discussion about, like, what it means to be French, to be a French person?, he says.

  No, Gustav says.

  Well there is. And the consensus is that to be a French person means to speak French, to have that as your mother tongue.

  So, Breece says, to be an A-burgian—

  To be an A-burgian means to leave A-burg, Gustav says.

  Breece hmphs. Got that right, he says.

  Zackly, Gustav says. As always, the goal is the journey.

  Breece shifts a leg. A-burg, man, he says. A city like the future—

  Mm, Marcus says. Soon as you get to it, it ceases to exist.

  There we go, Gustav says.

  Shit …, Marcus says, and pushes away his beaded glass. Miserable city. Miserable place. Who needs …? Just, like, truncate it, man. Trunc—

  Oh man—

  Marcus, man, Gustav says, and looks down, and crumples his face. I mean, enough. We’ve heard it. Truncate your damn truncation.

  Marcus gnarls. What, he says. You wanna truncate me …?

  Jeez, Marcus, Gustav says, and takes a sip. Your flaw is that you think you’re flawed.

  And yours is that you think you’re not, says Marcus.

  Breece nods at both.

  All three sip.

  So, Gustav says, and sits up. What you guys say …? It is now pushing seven thirty, and I propose that we, once again, make our Permanent Blast truly permanent.

  Ah, Breece says, and quiets into a think. OK, he then says.

  Sure, says Marcus.

  OK?, Gustav then says, and lifts his glass. Here goes—

  By Friday the fall has gone tangible, with winds getting testy and temperatures dipping to blade-cold, but Rick turns up in the office with scones. It’s an ample bag, bakery-white, and he puts it on his desk but aims its uncurled top towards Carol. She immediately envisions cranberries, is rewarded with her first reach.

  They have an objective today: to finish off their database of contacts, each of which, it seems, had been given its own piece of paper, or fragment thereof. Job-seekers, businesses, dates, referrals, phone numbers, interrelations – all will find places on the company ledger, which was formulated by Rick and taught to Carol over two afternoons. It will render their affairs much easier to manage. It will let them make something of their quiet time.

  They have no outside appointments this Friday – how they prefer it. Businesses forget everything by Monday, and folks already have their eye on the weekend. Better to stay domestic, durable, use the chance to work on office needs.

  Around three fifteen, Rick is typing at his computer. Hey, Carol?, he says, still looking at his monitor.

  Yessir, Carol says, also typing, transferring details of a collection agency on Williston Road.

  I got something here, Rick says.

  OK, Carol says, What—

  A development, Rick says.

  He gets up, walks to the front of his desk, looks out the window. He folds his arms across his chest, angles his eyes higher.

  My buddy came through, Rick says.

  Good, Carol says. So what’s—

  At Georgia Tech, Rick says, head leveling.

  He’s got s
omething for me, Rick says.

  Carol stops typing. Rick turns to her. He pauses, looks down. They need someone to fill in for—

  Carol stands, tugs her shirt to unwrinkled. She walks around the desk and comes to Rick, still standing and looking at the ground. She takes him in an embrace. Her cheek feels his warm, ripple-bone chest. He feels her splayed fingers across his back.

  Oh Rick, she says. You, too?

  Rick now hugs. I—

  Carol displaces by a quarter step. Air surprises two midriffs. But maybe …, Carol says. Maybe you might remember a few things. Things like my hands on the bottom of your ass as you’re pumping me. My lipping your nipples. Your tongue dipping, and dipping, into my cunt. You’re going to give that up for a gig in Georgia? You think it’s warmer down there …?

  Carol lifts away entirely, takes a step back. Looks at him. Turns and walks to her desk.

  I – I’m sorry, Rick says. Truly.

  Course you are, Carol says.

  Carol, it may lead to something.

  Rick looks at her. Come on, he says. You can’t tell me it isn’t understandable.

  Nope, can’t, Carol says, returning to her papers. That I can not do.

  She puts a page down on her desk, traces a detail with the tip of her pencil. Starts entering names and numbers into her computer, from her large, interlocking network of contacts.

  —And so OK, I get it, we all get it now: everything is numbers. Existence is a question of quantities, their relations and revelations and judgments. And that’s fine; that’s absolutely great. But in an age of brute numerics, a dispensation of ordinals and numerals, why do I not count?

  —Well, for me, unofficially, I can tell you that, well, people are just friendlier now. They smile, and say hello, even if you don’t even know them. And if you do know somebody, they have time to talk with you on the Street. Shop-owners are also very courteous. Gosh, they’re giving away drinking glasses when you buy gas over at the Mobil station. Haven’t seen that since movies from the Fifties.

  I’m not saying people are leaving their front doors open yet, but, you know, A-burg has become quite a livable spot, a town you can warm up to. Seems like a real good place to raise a family. It’s nice for me to come through here these three days a week.

  —Yeah, I mean, but think about it. Open your mind a little bit. Here, right here in A-burg, we have created clean fission. O yeah, we’re the ones who cracked it, who finally found the way to do it. I mean, think of all the energy being produced—

  —And I mean, what was the story there …? It’s like I go into this town on my way to Bennington, I like needed a ChapStick and maybe some BVDs and its a long drive so I figured I just better get them, then I see this big road sign for a place called Fairley’s with a fat red arrow on it, so OK, I make that turn. And then, right after that, I see another sign advertising and pointing towards the same store, this Fairley, so I drive down a block with shops and such and then, you know, there’s another sign for the same place. So I drive a bit more but I don’t see Fairley’s, and I’m driving and going and don’t know where I am, or where this shop is, if I’m supposed to stop, I’m lost, OK?, so I pull over and roll down my window to ask this white woman for directions. But before I even ask her, before I let go a word, she leans in and tells me: Next block. Right over there. Lady doesn’t even mention the store’s name. And she turns and she points and she smiles. OK?, she says. You’ll find what you’re looking for there, she tells me.

  So I’m like Thanks and I drive forward and, yeah, there it was, big huge place, parking lot like a lake, and I went in and bought the ChapStick and went to the register and everything was fine and all. Other people in the store, good wide aisles, got a good price too. But I didn’t buy anything else. Didn’t even look. Checked out. Moved on—

  —And I told him, I just told the guy this: No need any more. Everything, everything we know and everything we’ll need to, its all permanently put down somewhere, and retrievable too. E-mails, Google, Wiki-Tikki-Tavi, everything is everywhere, so why bother to—?

  —Yep, heard that, can’t avoid the idea, it unmakes a village—

  —So I’m just gonna lie down on College Street, just lay myself full-long down on the pavement and let them all run right over me, just getting where they’re going as quick as they can and don’t even look down. And then, maybe, if I have the guts, if I have the will, maybe I can contort my body in such way that the tread marks, the grooves and gullies of their getting away that slit right through my skin, that score my flesh my face my chest my legs my shins, maybe I can make the notched marks into something beautiful.

  —And there’s more: they’re promising an overhaul of the storm drainage system, so less runoff gets into Lake Chamoon, that stuff often has car gas in it. And they want to set up more drop-off points for recycling, those like bunker-like things for glass and paper, and sometimes you see metal. Things like that. I read that A-burg got over two hundred thousand dollars to do things like that through qualifying for Vermont’s Green City program, and they say they’re going to use the funds quick. The city lowered its carbon footprint, then just applied and got the grant, real quick. It’s good.

  And you know I had an idea, and I think it’s a winner: composting, like a center for the entire city, someplace convenient where everyone can bring their things to be composted to. I mean, it’s smart: don’t just throw that food and like ordinary stuff away, break it down naturally and put it to use in the local soil. I’d really like to get behind that, and I know someone, this Jack, a clerk in City Hall, and he told me he also thinks it’s good. He really thinks he can get it done—

  —Is it a window or is it a frame? Brushing aside this callow distinction, Blossfeldt’s pictures mate the resurgent estheticism of his time – think Art Nouveau – with photography’s movement away from pictoralism, as it embraced the need for its documentary capacities in a post-Victorian world tumbled by change. Finally, Blossfeldt’s unassuming floral catalogues, his seemingly prosaic images and unfussied compositions, pay homage, most of all, to the power of vision, its ability to seize, fix and thereby transform, even in elementary grays and white, whatever light can emanate from.

  —Yeah, OK, but factor in time, and standing in the same spot means you’re going backwards—

  She had given herself a deadline: finish the new billing stationery by Friday. And, happily, she’s risen to the challenge. By now, Carol has swapped fonts so many times, and has moved the letters, lines, and spaces around the page into so many configurations, that all trace of her original conception has passed into mist and speculation. But this, she thinks, has delivered her to a productive objectivity: whatever looks good right at the moment can fly. It is adequate, it is handsome, it is entirely OK. Until, of course, she looks again. Still, unbowed, she’s sure she’s moving in on something durable.

  She’s been assisted by a reduction in distractions. Two calls received on Tuesday. Two on Wednesday. And today, she thinks with an exhale, a number that makes those figures look good. It’s also two days since she’s made a call. But once more, there’s an upside: a smaller bill for her home phone.

  By four forty-five this Thursday, she feels that she’s sufficiently far along to give herself a reward. The success of the stationery’s current permutation – fourteen-point Bookman Old Style top right, ten-point center-justified sans-serif contact info at bottom has become not only a license but an imperative to take a jog. Carol runs infrequently, but she enjoys both overcoming her resistance to it and what it does for her – the steeliness and full-skin livingness she feels while panting afterward. It’s another of the advantages of being her own boss: she can reach for her sneaks whenever she wants.

  She goes to her closet, pulls out her sweatpants, a cotton top, and her Converse All-Stars, bought, easily, four years ago. It will be nice, she catches herself reaffirming: running up North Prospect Street, across on Archibald, up Intervale for a lap around Roosevelt Park, and back up Riverside
to Prospect. The gold-shine autumn sky will exhilarate; the breeze will be clean and its coolness echo in her chest; she won’t have to dodge cars. The course is long enough for her to feel it – definitely in her calves and through the arches of her feet. But that will pass, unlike the memory of feeling good for having gone for a run.

  She rehearses the route: up Prospect, across on Archibald, then Intervale to Roosevelt Park and Riverside to Prospect. Maybe once again around. She will go out, she will jostle and jog. Then she’ll return.

  —Here – this one can go here. Flop it goes, down on the floor.

  There isn’t much room left for me to put down cushions. I’ve got them at every point in my living room where floor touches naked wall. But those junctures soon ran out, so now I’ve got them almost everyplace else: in a line in front of the couch, in front of the fireplace, on the room-side of the television table, all around the music hutch, likewise for the tall cabinet. Luckily my living room is large, but there are already two or even three cushions jutting out from certain places, a scrabble game swelling with signifying squares. These days, I have to watch my steps when I walk through here; don’t want to jostle the congregation. Maybe its time to extend into the dining room.

  Presently I’m putting down one a day. I try to get over to Fairley’s once per week, and to find cushions that are the same size. They’re a little under two-foot square, and Fairley’s has them in a nice selection: dark tartans, dark orange, some checkerboards, some plain old brown. In fact, I don’t care what they look like, as long as they’re soft, capable of giving solace to sit-bones. They’re here, and I want them to be comfortable.

  It’s no big deal, only normal hospitality. I put down one cushion for, as best I can calculate, each five hundred who have left. Sure, the numbers are rough, but I hope the sitting isn’t. I want to offer them comfort. Now that they’re here.

  This isn’t the Samhain ritual. It’s just a convocation of the missing. An assemblage of essences. No music, no incense. Just unornamented presence. The one floor-lamp on. The air stirs every few seconds and, besides: don’t you feel how this room is warmer than the others?