Joy chuckled. “That’s nice. Actually, OCD stands for obsessive–compulsive disorder.”
“Gosh, ma’am, I-I wouldn’t know. I guess he is a little obsessive and compulsive about some things, but,” he was quick to add, “not in a bad way. Just very disciplined…or enthusiastic. Maybe that’s more like it. He just loves life and finds it very interesting. He’s never been to a doctor, so if he caught something like this OCD virus, I wouldn’t know.”
“Never been to a doctor?”
Cloverman shook his head. “Nope, not since he was born, anyway. Never had the need. He didn’t get out much, and I figure not mixin’ with people meant he avoided all their bugs. Just a theory.”
“Hmm, well lucky him,” Joy said.
“Yes, well, luck is a peculiar thing, ma’am,” Cloverman said. “One man’s luck can be another man’s misfortune.”
“What do you mean?”
“Oh, nothin’,” Cloverman said, regretting his words.
“Do you mean like if I found a twenty-dollar bill on the street I might think it my lucky day, but that it would also mean that someone had dropped the bill, and so for that person it would be unfortunate?”
Seeing an escape from his dilemma, Cloverman said, “Yes, ma’am, that would be an excellent example.”
“Or,” Joy said with a wily smile, “that maybe one person’s good luck might, well, cause another’s misfortune?”
“Gee-whiz, ma’am,” the old man said, tugging at the brim of his cowboy hat. “I’m sorry, but I ain’t no philosopher. Such questions are way beyond me.”
“Sure,” Joy said. “It’s a silly question anyway.”
She turned her attention back to the bedroom, and spotted an instrument case in the corner. She walked over to it and pointed. “What’s this?” she asked.
“A fiddle.”
“Have you ever heard him play?”
“Oh, sure. He’s very good. Self-taught. And not just at the fiddle.” Mr. Cloverman slid open the spacious, walk-in closet door, revealing enough musical instruments to fit an orchestra, including a saxophone and clarinet, a violin and cello, a guitar, flutes, bongos, and a didgeridoo. Then, as if anticipating her next question, he said, “The piano is in the piano room.”
“Piano room?”
“A guest room, I ‘spose you’d call it. Down the hall. But Murphy ain’t never had a guest, or even a visitor. ‘Cept me, of course. So he just calls it the piano room.”
“What are you going to do with all these instruments? They look expensive.”
“They are, but Murphy won’t be needing them anymore. He asked me to donate most of them to school music programs around Kansas.”
“Won’t be needing—? Why? What’s wrong with him?”
“Nothing. He’s fine,” the old man said, and then mumbled to himself, “…I hope.” He cleared his throat. “He’s moved, and his new accommodations don’t have the room.”
“I see,” Joy said, not really understanding. She reached for the beautifully crafted didgeridoo inside the closet. “May I?”
“Sure. Comes from Australia, you know?”
“He’s been to Australia? I thought he didn’t get out much.”
“A present from a fan.”
“Fan?”
“Er, pen pal. Yes, Mr. Drummer has a lot of pen pals.”
Joy picked up the didgeridoo and examined its exotic shape and markings. “And he can really play all of these? That’s-that’s remarkable.”
“Mr. Drummer has some ear, and not just for music. He told me once that he can hear things that others can’t.”
“Like what?” Joy asked, intrigued.
“Dunno exactly. He says the world is always singing.”
“Singing? He hears voices?”
“Nah, he’s a tad eccentric, but not crazy. He hears vibrations.”
Mr. Cloverman took a big seashell from a bookshelf and held it to Joy’s ear.
“Kinda like this, he told me.”
Joy listened to the shell and its reminiscent surf, and handed it back.
“So you might say he’s tuned into the rhythms of the world, is that it?”
“Exactly, young lady. A big symphony, he says. Filled with tempo and tones. Meter and melody. Pitch and pulse. Vibrations… He says he can even tell when the world around him is about to skip a beat, so to speak. Says he can sense it coming, kinda like how a surfer does a big wave.”
“So your Murphy really does march to the beat of a different drummer,” Joy quipped.
Mr. Cloverman nodded, and then nodded some more. “That he does, ma’am. That he does.”
Time Jugglers
Murphy, Morris, and Leroy sat on their cots eating off their lunch trays. Morris and Leroy were bemoaning their lousy lives and luck, playing a game of one-upmanship. They both had plenty of tales to tell. After each recounting, the other nodded in commiseration and began the next tough-break story.
Inevitably, Morris and Leroy’s reminiscing led to a discussion about dreams, though not of the nocturnal kind. As was their melancholy way, the two men talked of dreams lost or abandoned. As he listened, Murphy supposed that being locked up in a cell had a way of arching one’s thoughts in that bleak direction.
Morris said, “My dream? It was to make it into the Guinness Book of World Records.”
“And how were ya gonna do that?” Leroy asked.
“By reciting the entire Webster’s Dictionary in order from A through Z.”
“What the heck for?”
“Because I was sure that I could.”
Leroy scratched his noggin in incomprehension. “That’s somethin’, Morris. How would you keep all those words straight?”
“A really big Scrabble board in my head,” Morris said. “I could see all the words written out on long racks, line after line of them.”
Murphy asked, “Why didn’t you then, Morris?”
“I started to, but one day a bully at school ripped up my dictionary and gave me an atomic wedgy in front of the entire class.” He heaved a dreary sigh. “I lost the desire after that.”
“Damn bullies,” Leroy said. “How far did you get before the wedgy?”
“Milquetoast,” Morris replied dryly. “I got as far as the word ‘milquetoast.’ After that it was like some demon had flipped over my Scrabble board and trampled on my racks.” He sighed again and then put the question to Leroy. “How about you, Leroy? Did you have a dream?”
“Sure I did. Astronaut, at first.”
“At first?”
“Well, yeah,” Leroy said. “Until I learned about the kind of food you eat and how cramped those spaceships are. I’m a pretty big guy, ya know? So I changed my dream to aeronautical engineer.” He pronounced the words ‘aeronautical engineer’ with pride.
Murphy said, “Those are both fine dreams, Leroy. So, what stopped you?”
“Me, I guess,” Leroy answered. “But where I grew up the only dreams that weren’t laughed at were becoming a basketball player, a dealer, a gang member, or a pimp.” He dropped his head in shame, stuffed his hands into his pockets, and gave the floor a demoralized kick. “I can’t even make a decent paper airplane.”
Murphy said, “Well, I can show you that, Leroy. I know all kinds of designs. Jet fighters, Harriers, seaplanes, airliners, space shuttles, blimps, cruise missiles, and helicopters too.”
“You’d do that for me, Murphy?”
“Sure. If you’re gonna be an aeronautical engineer, you’ve got to start somewhere, right?”
Leroy’s eyes misted. “Thanks, man.”
Morris said, “How about you, Murphy? What do you dream about?”
Murphy looked away. “Nah, I can’t…”
Leroy said, “Come on, Murph. Tell us. We won’t laugh, will we Morris?”
“No way,” Morris said.
Murphy murmured, “A woman.”
Leroy exclaimed, “We all got that dream, man!”
“Yeah, Murphy,” Morris said. “Besides,
you’re a great guy. Handsome, smart as a whip, and super nice. I don’t see the problem.”
“Yeah,” Leroy chimed in. “You’s a stud, Murphy. Lots of ladies would dig a cool dude like you!”
Murphy said, “One is enough. One is everything.”
The two felons reflected on Murphy’s words and nodded in understanding. Neither man had even had a date before. To the minds of Morris and Leroy, love was a dream more far-fetched than becoming an aeronautical engineer or the reciting of a dictionary from front to back.
The bleak acknowledgment returned Morris and Leroy to their previous states of despair, and to the recounting of more hard-luck stories from their disappointing lives.
Murphy picked up on their change of mood and felt like a louse for having put his two friends on such a glum path. He knew that their thoughts would only lead them to a desolate and hopeless dead end.
He interrupted their tales of woe and said, “No, fellas. You shouldn’t think that way. Nothing is fixed. Life never stands still. Every day is precious. Every hour holds an opportunity. Every minute contains wonders just waiting to flower.”
“I dunno,” Leroy said. “We must be livin’ in different time zones, Murph, ‘cuz where I stand every day is doomsday.”
“Yeah,” Morris said. “Hard times and bad times are the only times I’ve ever known.”
“Fellas,” Murphy entreated, “don’t pay any attention to the little man in you. Give ear to the big you, the one you were created to be!”
“Murphy,” Morris said, “in case you haven’t noticed, I’m five-three. Leroy could eat off my head.”
Leroy said, “I’m a big guy, but I got a peanut for a brain.”
“No, fellas. You’re being too negative. We are all an instrument in the great symphony of life, and a vast, cosmic mind flows through each of us. Maybe I’m a fiddle, and Morris, maybe you’re a French horn. And Leroy, you could be a piccolo.”
Morris and Leroy turned appraisingly to each other, each man conjuring up the other’s instrument.
Leroy arched a skeptical eyebrow and scratched his chin. “Sorry, but I think Morris is a tuba, and no ways I’m a dinky little piccolo, Murph.”
“Okay, then,” Murphy smiled, “a didgeridoo. How’s that?”
“A didgeri-who?”
Morris said, “An Australian Aboriginal wind instrument. Don’t worry. It’s big and long, and makes a cool sound.”
“Okay, then,” Leroy said, satisfied. “I’m a didgeridoo.”
“I still don’t get it,” Morris said. “If there’s a symphony going on, I sure don’t hear it, and the only thing blowing through me and Leroy is last night’s awful dinner.”
Leroy laughed. “Morris is a tuba, all right.” He pinched his nose. “Woo-wee, for such a little guy that man can sure toot!”
Murphy said, “You don’t hear it or see it because you’re not paying attention. First, you need to acknowledge that it is there. The big you knows all about it, but the little you has stuffed cotton in your ears and put blinders on your eyes.”
Morris and Leroy exchanged dubious looks. They turned to Murphy and shook their heads in incomprehension.
Murphy stroked his chin and tried another analogy. He said, “Energy, fellas. The universe is electric, magnetic, and alive. Everything is energy, and we each arrived charged to do our positive best!”
“Charged with fraud, you mean,” Morris snorted.
“Heck, I’d take fraud over robbery and assault with a squirt gun,” Leroy said.
“I’m talking vibration, boys. Vibration.”
“Hell,” Leroy said, “bad vibes are all I ever get.”
“Vibration?” Morris scoffed. “Sure, sure. I got your vibration right here. It’s called frustration, aggravation, vexation, incarceration!”
“Fellas,” Murphy implored, “you’re thinking about it in the wrong way. Think in and out, up and down, off and on—think rhythm and harmony.” Murphy shifted his jaw in thought, and then hitting upon an idea he said, “Here, I’ll show you. Throw me your fruit…”
Murphy stood and began juggling his own apple and orange. Morris and Leroy took the fruit from their lunch trays and tossed them to Murphy, who smoothly incorporated them into his act. In a few seconds he was juggling two apples, two oranges, a pear, and a banana with ease.
Murphy said, “You fellas think I’m juggling these fruit, but I’m not. I’ve only added myself into their equation. Watch. Listen. Feel and follow…”
Murphy hummed a bouncy beat and continued juggling the colorful fruit. Morris and Leroy observed Murphy’s antics with amazement. Entranced by Murphy’s catchy song and the revolving apples and oranges, pear and twirling banana, the two men felt transported to another world.
Morris and Leroy stood and began to mimic Murphy, juggling imaginary produce, and getting into the rhythm; each man strutting and prancing in his own private Xanadu.
Murphy said, “Can you hear it?”
Juggling his invisible fruit, a big fat grin on his face, Leroy said, “I hear it, man! The symphony! I hear it!” He was juggling like a master.
Morris exclaimed, “Vibration!”
Leroy said, “Gyration!”
“Oscillation!” said Morris.
“Rotation!” laughed Leroy.
Murphy said, “Good, good. Now close your eyes and see the song. See it flowing like a river. Hear it like an ocean’s surf.”
“Undulation!” said Morris.
“Navigation!” said Leroy.
“Circulation!”
“Gravitation!”
The three men juggled, danced, and laughed uproariously.
Morris now saw himself on a merry-go-round. He was going up and down, round and round, lobbing letters from the alphabet high into the air and catching them again. Leroy had changed into a tuxedo with tails. He was boogying on a mountaintop, hurling stars and colorful crystal planets across the universe.
Outside the jail, Officer Locke heard the men’s whooping laughter. “What are those fruitcakes up to now?”
He stomped into the lockup and saw the three inmates juggling and grooving, singing and rapping to themselves. They were oblivious to their jailer, separated from him by a vast and merry reverie. Officer Locke squinted in disbelief and his jaw unhinged. “What the—?”
“Woohoo!” exclaimed Leroy.
“Yippee!” cried Morris.
Morris leapt from his merry-go-round and moonwalked over to an imaginary meadow of buttercups and daffodils. He cast his Scrabble letters high into the sky, spun his chubby frame twice around, saw the letters arching and tumbling through the air, and then dropping to one knee, he caught the letter Z behind his back. “Yeah, baby!” Without losing a beat he continued juggling.
Officer Locke shook his head at the lunacy before him. “Fruitcakes,” he repeated. And then to his surprise, he realized that his foot had begun tapping on the floor by its own volition to a beat that only his foot seemed to know. His head began to bob. A little swivel took over his hips. And he smiled.
···
Still in Murphy’s bedroom, Joy asked, “Was he born with this ability, Mr. Cloverman? This ‘song’ you mentioned?”
“Yes and no. Murphy claims that everyone has it, but that they have forgotten how to find and use it.”
“Well, why should he have remembered?”
“It was by accident.”
“Accident?”
Mr. Cloverman nodded. “Accidents, actually.” He paused, and then said with a touch of mournfulness, almost as if adding a footnote, “An unending river of them.”
Joy knitted her brow in confusion. “What do you mean?”
“I-I don’t know, ma’am. It’s the darnedest thing. But ever since he was a baby accidents seemed to happen wherever he went.”
“But that can’t be possible.”
“Can’t explain it myself, ma’am. But I witnessed hundreds of ’em over the years. Suffered many of ’em myself, I’ll admit.” He pointed t
o a tiny scar above his left eyebrow, and then rolled up a sleeve and a pant leg and evidenced a couple more scars.
Joy frowned and squatted to stroke Lot’s soft fur. “What about the dog?” she asked.
“Immune,” Lucas said.
“Why?”
“Dunno, but Murphy and Lot are like one being. The dog is real smart and I think understands every one of Murph’s little foibles. I’ve long had a hunch that he somehow knew what Murph would do before Murph did!”
Joy cupped the dog’s face in her hands and kissed him on the snout. She stood back up and said, “So, you’re saying it was this same bad luck that taught Mr. Drummer how to hear the song?”
“That’s right,” Lucas said. “It’s like in those old kung fu movies, ya know? Where the teacher always surprise attacks his student until the student learns to sense the attack before it happens. The way I see it, Murphy was a very sensitive boy who never wanted to hurt nobody. It pained him to the core of his being to see people hurt. So devout and sincere was his longing to fix his jinx, so intense his prayers, that he somehow developed this marvelous ability. I ain’t no psychologist or philosopher or preacher, ma’am, but I know what I know, seen what I seen. The darnedest thing, I tell ya.”
Joy said, “But surely he didn’t cause all these things to happen to people.”
“Don’t matter,” Cloverman said. “He thought so.”
“But why?”
Lucas took off his greasy cowboy hat, rubbed his head, and put it back on. “Well,” he said, “according to Murphy, he thought maybe it was magnetic, that there was something about him that interfered with other people’s magnetic fields, which he said are really just vibrations anyway.”
“Is that what you think?”
“Me? Nah. I think it is something much simpler than that. I think it was guilt. But, like I say, I ain’t no psychologist.”
“Guilt?”
Lucas smiled warmly at Joy. A gleam in his wise eyes, he said, “It’s really not the house that you’re interested in, is it now little missy?”
Caught off guard, Joy stuttered, “I-I…”
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