by Unknown
Traffic patrol discovered McKinley’s Ford Focus when they ran the plates for the hydrant violation. Police searched for him, hoping to find him intact for the papers, but they were far too late. When they found what little remained of McKinley, he looked like a bloated white worm, dried and sun blanched. The police let a Reagan take photographs for the morning broadcasts and copied the images for their internal paperwork. Officially, Doctors at the UPMC recommended further studies into what might have blocked the nausea response to violence in this particular McKinley. Assaults, sex crimes, and murder charges committed by Presidents were spiking slightly this year, but were still very low against general statistics for a population of this size.
Once Homicide gathered the evidence they needed from the hedgerow, they called in a group of apprentice McKinleys for cleanup. As the McKinleys, a half dozen young men in Municipality of Pittsburgh coveralls, shoveled away the body and sprayed down his deathbed with chemicant, McKinley’s brain ticked through its final programmed stages – constitutionally mandated thoughts and reveries meant to appease the consciences of the legislators who had dreamed up or supported the President Program. McKinley remembered his mother, sweet Nancy, serving him Apple Pie on the Fourth of July. He remembered growing old with the ravishing Ida Saxton, and remembered the jewel-colored feathers of the parrot he’d named Washington Post, his favorite. As McKinley’s brain jellified, he thanked the Lord Jesus Christ for the salvation of his eternal soul, and terminated with an image of the American Flag rippling in the sunlit wind, unfurled over waves of autumn grain and the purple mountains, which were painted in majesty.
A MOTHER’SLOVE
BY NICOLE TANQUARY
My heart had fallen out again. I made a low whining noise, gathering the reddish meat in my hands and then creeping towards the door. I heard a voice. Mother talking … just her. I nudged at the wood with my shoulder, and crept out into bright light and walls and whitewash.
Mother was speaking into a phone. Her teeth gnawed at her lip, smearing the white edges with velvet-red lipstick. I crawled closer to her, three-legged, clutching my heart to my chest with one hand. She wore a gray sweater that fell a good ways past her knees, and I reached up and tugged at its hem. She glanced down at me. The creases in her forehead immediately softened, a smile turned up in one cheek. Then she noticed the wet, dripping thing in my hand, and the smile turned to an anxious line.
Squeezing the phone between her shoulder and ear, she went into the living room and rummaged about for her sewing bin.
“Uh huh … yes, I know … I know, I … did I mention, I just picked up two new customers last Saturday, fancy stuff, dresses and things that I can … yes … uh huh … yes, I understand. Goodnight then.” Mother returned the phone to its place beside the sewing table, then ran a hand through her dye-streaked hair. Her eyes were a tired gray.
I tugged at her sweater again. The heart-meat was slippery to hold. I was worried that it would fall between my fingers and back into the carpet. I let out a soft moan. My poor heart, all covered in lint!
Mother reached down to gather me in her arms. Then she laid me across her sewing table, belly-up and exposed to the world. She spent a moment searching for her glasses, and jammed them back above her nose.
She took a moment to examine the rip that had appeared in my chest. Her tongue clucked against the back of her front teeth. Her earlier needlework had been loosened, the stitches opened, severed in places. “You’ve been pulling at them, haven’t you?” she said. I felt worms of guilt wriggle in my chest. Sometimes she knitted me up too tight, and the thread pulled my skin painfully taut. I would tear at it with my fingernails, whimpering till the stitches widened, just enough for me to feel I could breathe.
I must have whimpered now, because Mother said “Hush, love,” as she pet back layers of skin to nestle the heart back in its place in my ribcage. “I’m sorry I couldn’t fix this earlier; I’ve been having to take on so much extra work…”
I know, I wanted to say. Lately, whenever I made the trip to her sewing room, I found her sitting at her table, squinting at fine needlework and threads and knots, in a trance so deep that it seemed nothing could wake her. Beloved blouses, jeans, dress pants, even an old suit or two … all were reworked under her hands. Sometimes she would stay like that for hours, hands flying, glasses sitting slightly askew. I would have to almost shriek to get her attention.
She plucked a thick black thread out of her stores, tying it to the eye of her needle. My gaze fixed on her face. She did not notice, and began to hum to herself (hmm-m-m-hm) as the needle-point dug into my chest. I felt it go back and forth across the rip, bringing the two halves together once again. My chest started to feel tight, but I did not make a sound. I promised myself that I would not pull at the stitches again. I did not want things falling out of me any more.
When Mother had finished with my heart, her warm hands searched the rest of me, pulling at this, picking at that. There was a hesitation. Then her delicate sewing-scissors came out, and she snipped at the slack threads in my shoulder. “Hm. Messy. You’ve pulled at this one, too.” I remained silent. She kept her head down and her gaze on her work. We stayed like that for an age.
Then I forced my mouth open, pushing my rough sandpaper tongue into motion. I wanted to tell her thank you, like good children are supposed to. Thank you for being my Mother.
What came out was a thin croaking sound. Mother’s eyes turned upwards, and the red-velvet smile returned, more firmly this time. “I know, love,” she said. I fell into unhappy silence. She had understood what I meant, but I wanted to tell her with words…
Silence twisted between the two of us until I could almost taste its cold slime on my tongue. I listened to Mother breathe as she worked. Her head turned slightly, and the smell of lemons came washing down, a yellow-pink scent that came from the shampoo bottles in the bathroom.
I could smell my own body, too. Even under the perfume Mother smeared on me in the mornings to keep the flies away. Like skunk-meat.
There was a final snip of the scissors. “Done,” she announced. I continued to lie still. My skin felt too tight around me, and I worried that if I moved, everything would come undone again.
Mother seemed to understand. Her hands slid under my back, and she lifted me close to her chest, carrying me gently into the hallway. Paintings and mirrors flashed by in motions of color. Then we were in the living room, and she deposited me on the sagging couch beside the TV. She took a moment to arrange me against the pillows, so that I could see the screen without having to strain my neck.
The television burst into life, revealing a program about leopards. I could see their sleek, dappled skins moving in and out of the foreground. My eyes locked onto the black spots, so much like holes. An announcer was talking, his voice as sleek as the leopard-fur.
I felt Mother plant a sticky kiss on my forehead. I followed the sound of her soft steps retreating over the carpet. Then the silence returned.
I rested, watching the leopards as they brought down assorted four-legged animals and, following the meal, licked the blood from one another’s ears. Sometimes they would gorge themselves while the animal was still alive, ignoring its feeble thrashings as they tore chunks from its belly. I watched without a sound. Somewhere in the leopard’s world, a bird suddenly trilled a little song. Happy, happy day in the leopard jungle.
Death was the way of nature channels. Sometimes the prey would get away, sometimes it would not. Sometimes the leopards would make it through the harsh times, sometimes they would starve. The world kept turning. Things kept dying, and everything was right with the world.
After a while, my fingers began picking unconsciously at the pillow hem, a pale-blue, frayed thread that annoyed me. But my eyes stayed on the screen. It was what Mother wanted.
Sometimes my nature shows would switch to ones about people. Death was there, too. Sometimes you could even pick out the leopards from the gazelles. You could see it on their faces;
the gluttony on one, the terror and pain on another as the life slowly leaked out of them.
Mother hummed in the other room (hmm-m-m-hm) as she worked. Time passed. One of the leopard cubs was abandoned by its mother … it was sick, or something.
Eventually, my own Mother stopped humming, maybe because her voice was sore.
When the living cubs were all grown and gangly with adolescence, I glanced at the clock. One of my eyes started drifting of its own accord, the muscles behind it growing loose, but I forced myself to focus on the numbers.
Settling back into the pillows, my gaze returned to the nature show. Mother would collapse onto her bed in about four hours. Then I would begin my nightly ritual: I would push myself off of the couch and crawl four-legged across the carpet to her room. She would have fallen asleep along the top of her bed, arms splayed, still as a corpse. I would reach up and maneuver her legs around until the blanket covered them, push a cushion under her head, making sure she would be comfortable when she awoke. Afterwards, I would stand there and stare at her for a while. Maybe curl a strand of her hair around one finger. Maybe stroke the soft flesh of her cheek, and mumble a little noise that was supposed to be, “Goodnight.”
Then I would leave and lie awake somewhere in the house until light came streaming through the cracks in the window shades. If Mother were not up by nine, I would shake her awake, croaking gently. She would jerk, see me, smile and pet the top of my head. “My little alarm clock,” she would murmur.
I rubbed my chest, gently, trying to massage away the ache that was building. The stitches looked like black leopard-teeth for a moment, criss-crossed in joined ‘V’ shapes down the length of the tear. I had the urge to pick at them again, to take the sharpness out of the teeth, but I held back.
The TV had switched to an advertisement for Febreeze. The family there looked clean and perfect, inhaling air freshener scent with something like worship. I let out another little noise, an echo of Mother’s much deeper sighs. Advertisements made me feel exhausted.
The window was cracked open, just a little, because it had been a stuffy summer day, and the night-wind was cooling the streets to more reasonable temperatures. Mother was very careful about keeping the house cool. So I wouldn’t rot as fast, she told me, her gray eyes shiny. I sucked in a breath, enjoying the feeling of air against the insides of my lungs. Then I paused. If my neck hadn’t been held stiff by threads, I would have cocked my head to one side. Soft air dragged across the floor, along with an aroma.
It smelled like … like … cooking?
I wondered. Mother was a fan of things she could stick in the microwave and have ready a minute or two later, things like containers of mashed potatoes and already-made soups, the occasional TV dinner. This smell was different from any of those. Deeper, somehow. It had a sort of greasy tang that hit the back of my throat. It was a smell you could almost taste.
I smacked my lips, trying to sort it out. But I had no idea. Mother had never made it.
I slipped off the couch, barely noticing the twinges along my rib cage as I moved closer to the window. I stuck my nose against the mesh screen that separated me from the Outside, inhaling deeply. Yes. I could definitely smell it now.
Sweet potato fries. The thought drifted up to me from a dark place, a place where something had stirred. Someone is making sweet potato fries. They just dropped them into the grease.
I froze, my fingers curling against the windowsill. Confusion rocked me back and forth. Sweet potato fries? What? They didn’t fit in with Mother’s mashed-soup-TV diet. No … maybe I had heard the name on one of those restaurant advertisements that came on between nature shows. But –
The grease smell grew stronger, and the thing that had stirred in the dark place flung another thought upwards, a thought that bumped against the top of my mind with the softness of a pillow: Fresh-made sweet potato fries. Nothing beats those. Help Mom chop up the sweet potatoes, help fry them in that old cooker on the stove, and she’ll give you an extra helping with your dinner.
I stumbled back from the window. Faces flashed in the corners of my vision; a woman with tired, lined eyes, her head topped by a mass of black curls you wanted to bury your face into when you were about to cry. A soft smile, with, maybe, sometimes, a sheen of gloss on the lips (when she was going out somewhere special). Warm arms, outstretched and hugging me gently.
A man, too, though his face was little more than a passing shadow.
The echo of a squeal came to me, along with the faces of three other children (two that felt younger and one that felt older.) They were sharing a plate of greasy orange-gold fries. I could see the second youngest searching for the most burnt, the oldest searching for the crispiest, the woman cutting the fries into easier-to-chew pieces for the very youngest, who had fat baby cheeks still.
But – the dark place within me receded, leaving me an anxious mess – but what about Mother? She and the woman were most definitely two different people. A moan eased out of my throat. I only have one Mother, I told myself. Be a good boy and keep watching your nature show.
Still, I found myself creeping across the carpet to the front door, knuckling forward like the gorillas I sometimes watched on my nature channel. I groped for the knob, trying to remember how Mother slid back the locks, copying her from memory. The smell, the glorious smell, glowed inside my nose.
Mother’s humming drifted to me from her sewing room, suggesting busy hands and the fierce concentration that meant she should not be disturbed. A part of me hesitated. Mother often warned me about how it was outside. It was dangerous for children, she told me. A dog-eat-dog place. My thoughts drifted to leopards…
Another push of air came through the window, and this time I might have heard a sound, nestled somewhere amid the greasy scent. A sizzle, maybe. Or talking.
I twisted at the doorknob. My wrists felt thin as sticks, their dead tendons stretching with the strain of it. I growled in frustration. I forced my fingers tighter, then, grunting, managed to move the knob all the way around. I pushed my shoulder into the wood with as much strength as I could muster.
It opened.
I stared out at a small square of grass. My eyes turned upwards, and I cowered against the weight of the sky. I saw clouds, dark-purple masses that looked like the fur of some great, undulating beast passing overhead. My breath caught in my throat.
I edged one foot down the concrete steps, then the other, clutching at myself in the sheer helplessness of the moment. My feet sank ankle-deep into the long, neglected grass at the bottom. It had rained that morning, and water began engulfing my feet in a sudden puddle.
Mother’s world loomed behind me. But I was awash in the grease-smell.
The wind carrying it came from a house off to my right. Its yard was pushed up against Mother’s, the lawns separated by a tangled, black streak of hedge. A streetlight gleamed above, and the hedge’s leaves were shiny in the drunken light.
Definite voices accompanied the aroma, now. They were softened by the night, but I could make out a woman’s, soft and sweet. There were also the higher tones of a child. No … more than one child. My bones shivered for a moment; the strange, awful familiarity was like nails raking my spine. I dropped low and crept through the grass, hissing when I set my hand down on a pricker weed that took off little flecks of skin from my palm.
There was a hole in the hedge a little larger than my head. I slunk forwards until I was sitting beside it. The dark thing brewing inside me spoke up again. Danny played soccer in the front yard, it whispered. He must’ve kicked his ball through the hedge, and the hedge hasn’t grown back in this spot yet. The hole is about as big as his ball…
I gibbered, sitting back and covering my eyes with my hands. Images, sounds, scents, tastes, sensations swirled together into an almost tangible substance. From them, pulses of joy lit in me like candle flames embedded in shadow. But with the joy came a horrible fear.
I did not try to force my way through the hedge, afraid that
one of the twigs might catch on a stitch and I would come undone. Instead, I poked my head through the hole. From it I could see a window, gold light spilling out to paint a square on the grass beyond it. The glass was thrown wide open, but the space was covered by a mesh, to keep out the summer mosquitoes.
I could see a tray set by the window, a fringe of white at the edge … the sweet potato fries I had smelled, spread across paper towels to drain the grease as they cooled. “All right, who’s hungry?” came the woman’s voice. There was a chorus of “Meee!”s, and the woman appeared, a stack of plates in her hand. She was wearing her favorite apron, one covered in purple-red and orange stains that had soaked so deep into the cloth, not even bleach could get them out.
I let out a cry of pain.
Her eyes snapped up, almost hidden in the black curls, and our gazes locked. I saw everything in an instant. How, beneath the forced smile, pain had crystallized … crystallized into spikes that jostled against the walls of her heart … she remembers that these were my favorite, she misses me, she misses me and she hasn’t made these since the accident, and she’s trying to be strong for the other kids’ sakes and she’s really dying on the inside and-
There was a horrible scream from behind me. I whirled around to find Mother on the doorstep, her gray-streaked hair frizzed crazily around her face, her glassy eyes wide. Panic took me like an animal; I was prey, and there was a leopard out there. Nothing else mattered.
I pelted out across the lawn, away from Mother, my fingernails skittering against gray concrete … twin white-hot lights appeared off to my right, and I froze. I could see Mother running at me out of the corner of my eye. I could see the car as it passed beneath the streetlight. A great big silver van, hanging so low it almost brushed against the ground.