Big Picture: Stories

by Percival Everett

Michael picked up the head; the newspaper crackled in his arms. “Okay, then. Thanks.” He left the restaurant struggling with the door; the bell hanging from the door handle hushed as it caught between his thigh and the glass. Michael put the pig on the passenger seat of his truck. He left it wrapped in spite of his urge to open its one-eyed face to the world. He put the truck into gear, released the brake, and rolled away, listening to an exhaust tick in his engine that he had not previously noticed.

  Michael stopped in Laramie outside a pawn shop to use a pay telephone. First he checked the answering machine at what used to be his home, noting with some disappointment that his action betrayed a failure to completely disengage. That failure was underscored by his feeling of deflation on not finding any messages. He placed a second call to his agent in Santa Fe.

  “Hello, Gloria,” Michael said. “I’m on the road and I can’t be reached for a while.”

  “What’s the matter now?” Gloria asked.

  Michael imagined the stout woman sitting in the overstuffed chair in front of her television. “Nothing’s the matter. My wife is having her pimples cured by the handsome Dr. Bob; I’ve left the house; and I burned all the new paintings.”

  “You didn’t.”

  “I did. Like I said. I can’t be reached. I’ll call you soon. I never loved her anyway.”

  “When you loved her, you became despondent and tried to kill yourself. Now, you claim you never loved her and so you destroy your work.”

  The head of the Dicotyles tajacu was wrapped in newspaper, sitting on the seat of the truck, dead for twenty-five years, but still breathing. Michael could hear it. He left the boar while he went into the deli near the train tracks for lunch since his stomach was complaining and feeling tight. He sat alone, undisturbed, and ate a vegetarian sandwich from which he pulled out the cucumbers and heard the waitress say, “I don’t like those either.”

  Outside, the air had turned crisp and Michael found himself stepping quickly toward his truck. He was struck suddenly by the distance, not the physical distance, not the miles, nor the change in landscape, but the remoteness from the life he had known just a few days before. He was still a painter: he could buy oils and brushes and canvas and make pictures and there were paintings in the world bearing his mark, but he was no longer a husband, no longer a lover, and he no longer resided in that house in Denver with the detached studio and pool he never wanted.

  “Michael?” the voice found him just as he was opening the door of his truck.

  Michael turned around. It was Harley Timmons, a sculptor who lived in Laramie, who worked in steel and found objects, who by all measures, in Michael’s thinking, was severely untalented, although not unsuccessful. Harley was a heavy man, brawny from lifting steel and working with welding equipment. He had wide-set eyes and an extremely narrow and large nose, which looked like a fin on his face.

  “Michael Lawson,” Harley said. “I don’t believe it. I saw the truck and I said, hey, that looks familiar, then I saw this black guy getting in it and I said, hey, that must be, and it is. How are you doing?”

  “Oh, I’m fine,” Michael said. “How are you, Harley?”

  “Great.” Harley pumped Michael’s hand and showed big muscular teeth. “I’m just great. What brings you up here?”

  “Came up to do a little camping and fishing,” Michael said, noting as the last word was out, that he had no camping and fishing gear in his truck. “Headed up to the Winds.”

  Harley nodded, still flexing his smile. “Why don’t you spend the night here and have dinner with Sumiko and me?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “I insist. We’ve got a new guest room we haven’t tried out on anyone yet. Come on. You can tell me about the new work.” Harley’s face seemed so close.

  Michael fell back, if not physically, inside. New work? The prospect of discussing the nonexistent was just depressing enough to sound intriguing, he thought. He said, “Okay.”

  “Well, great, just great,” Harley said. “I’m sure there’s stuff you’ve got to do, so I’ll just tell you that dinner’s at seven, but come anytime you want.”

  “Thanks.”

  “Great.”

  “Great,” Michael said. He watched Harley walk away and disappear into the Whole Earth Grain Store in front of which a young woman in a peasant dress swept an already tidy sidewalk.

  Michael got into his truck, agreeing with Harley that he probably had some things to do, like maybe buying some camping gear or a fishing rod. That’s what he did. He went to a sporting goods store and bought a sleeping bag, a backpack, a campstove, a couple of bottles of white gas, a small tent, a canteen, a four-piece pack fly rod, a reel, two fly boxes, and an assortment of flies, stoneflies, Woolly Buggers, Royal Coachmen, Zug Bugs, sizes 8 to 12, and a fishing license. His bill came to 418 dollars and 47 cents. He paid with his American Express card and a young man helped him carry his new stuff to his truck.

  After he bought all of this gear, Michael was eager to get on the road and do some camping; he felt an excitement he hadn’t felt in years. But he had told great big Harley that he would be there and, although Harley was not important to Michael, it would be impolite not to show up and awkward trying to explain why he was leaving Laramie just late enough to find a campsite in the dark of night. Michael drove out Ninth Street and into the canyon north of town where he pulled off onto a side road, sat in the back of his truck, and sorted the flies into the compartments of the fly boxes. He classified them slowly, by kind and size, and paid careful attention to their placement.

  He left for Harley’s house just as the sun was nearing the top of the Snowy Range. He drove into Laramie on Ninth, then turned left on Grand Avenue over to Seventh where in 1913 or so a black man had been lynched on a pole that was still standing, now shouldering power and phone lines. The man had been dragged out of jail by citizens who were chastised the next day by the editor of the town paper for being such poor shots. Out of the hundreds of rounds fired at the hanging man only one bullet found its mark. Michael always looked at the pole as he drove by; the cracked and weathered brown pole pressed against the sky, which tonight was washed lavender at sundown.

  At the door of the sizable, but modest house, Michael was met by Sumiko who was as small as Harley was large. Her smile was no less brutish or feral, in fact it was even more savage, coming like an ambush from this little creature.

  “It’s great to see you,” Sumiko said, as her little feet somehow got her behind him. She pushed him into the house, into the vestibule floored with tiles that had been carved by hand, a fish here, a primitive bison there. Michael felt the unevenness of the floor through his shoes. He put down his suitcase.

  “It’s good to see you, too, Sumiko.”

  “Harley’s not back yet. He’s at the chiropractor. He’s got a bad back. You know, all that lifting.”

  Michael nodded.

  “Come on into the kitchen,” Sumiko said. “You can keep me company while I finish dinner. This is great.”

  He followed Sumiko through the living room, walking past one of his early paintings. He realized that he had made it, but didn’t know how he could have.

  “We move that piece around the house,” Sumiko said. “I liked it when you used more form.”

  Michael smiled and hoped she heard.

  In the kitchen, Michael found the light white and harsh, discharging from broad panels implanted in the ceiling and ricocheting mercilessly off stainless steel cabinets, stove, and refrigerator.

  “What do you think of our new kitchen?” she asked.

  “It’s very … metal,” Michael said.

  “We like to think so.” Sumiko walked to the stove and looked into something she had simmering on a burner. “Sit down, sit down.”

  Michael sat at the table and watched her tiny feet carry her from refrigerator to stove to cabinet to refrigerator as she tied on a little apron. “How about some wine?” she asked, suddenly.

  “I don’t drink.”<
br />
  “I remember not liking that about you.” She laughed. “May I get you anything to drink? Juice?”

  “I’m okay right now,” Michael said.

  Sumiko took a bottle of white wine from the refrigerator and poured a glass for herself. “A little wine never hurt anybody, Michael.”

  Michael nodded.

  “So, how’s Gail?”

  “I think she’s well,” he said.

  Sumiko looked at him over the rim of her wine glass. “You think?”

  “We’re trying out a separation.”

  “Here’s to a successful one,” Sumiko said, raising her glass, then taking a sip. “I never liked her anyway. She’s not strong enough for you.”

  “What’s in the pot?” Michael asked.

  “Oh, it’s cream of eggplant soup.” She rose to her toes to catch a glimpse of the activity in the pot. “It’s the first time I’ve made it. You’re a guinea pig, I guess.”

  “I’m willing,” he said.

  Then Sumiko’s face changed, she sighed, and her eyes, although not really softening, showed that they wanted to soften, and she walked to Michael and touched his face. “I’m so sorry. Poor, poor Michael,” she said, sitting at the table with him. “But isn’t this great? Sitting here, together and all.”

  Michael nodded.

  Harley came in through the front door, and said with his booming, smiling voice, “Some fool left a fortune of camping gear outside free for the taking.”

  Michael stood up as Harley entered the kitchen. “Maybe that’s not a good idea,” he said.

  “Oh, don’t worry,” Harley said. “This is Laramie, not Denver.”

  Michael sat back down.

  Sumiko handed a glass of wine to Harley. “What did he say about your back?”

  “Well, he cracked it this way and he cracked it that way,” Harley said, twisting his body to indicate the treatment. “Then he stretched me and told me not to pick up anything heavy. I laughed in his face. I had half a mind to pick him up and laugh right into his face. Like this.” He grabbed Sumiko by her waist and she squealed and then he hoisted her to eye level and laughed right in her face and then they laughed together.

  “Where’s your bathroom?” Michael asked.

  “Down the hall,” Harley said, letting Sumiko’s feet down to the black and white tiles. “You’ll see it.”

  Michael walked down the corridor and before he turned into the bath, he heard Sumiko whisper to Harley, “They’ve split up.” He closed the door behind him and switched on the light, nearly collapsing as he did so: everything was so bright. The room was white everywhere, white fixtures, white walls, white tile, white bidet, white towels, and even the soap in the white dish was white. He wanted to pee just to create some contrast, some relief not merely for his bladder but for his suffering eyes. He was dizzied by the brutal starkness of it all and the headache that had been at work in the back of his brain rose another notch in intensity. He imagined walking into this room and switching on the light in the middle of the night, having just come out of a sound sleep. He might have to do just that. He shuddered as he approximated the magnitude of the headache that might be caused by such a visual concussion. He flushed, washed his hands, reluctantly dried them on a stiff white towel, and went back to Harley and Sumiko in the kitchen.

  “Do you have another bathroom?” Michael asked.

  “There’s one in our bedroom,” Harley said, his big smile filled with concern. “Something wrong with the other one?”

  “No, nothing,” Michael said. “Just wondering. Your house is done very nicely.”

  “Thanks,” Harley said.

  “Taste this,” Sumiko said, coming to Harley with a spoon, her free hand cupped under it. “Be careful, now, this is hot. Blow on it first.” She blew on it for him.

  Harley blew on it too, then sucked in the soup. “That’s great.”

  “Want a taste, Michael?” Sumiko asked.

  Michael sat down at the table again. “Thanks, but I think I’ll wait.” He squinted against the pain in his head.

  “Something wrong?” Sumiko asked. “You’re squinting. Is the light hurting your eyes?”

  “Nope.”

  “Hey, man, you want to lie down before dinner?” Harley asked, sitting across the table, crossing his legs, and playing with the laces of one of his enormous boots.

  Michael shook his head.

  The doorbell rang. “That’ll be Eddie and Simon,” Harley said and left the room.

  “You’ll love these people,” Sumiko said. “Eddie’s a writer and Simon, he’s a doctor and well, you’ll see.”

  Harley came rolling into the kitchen with the guests who were laughing loudly with him. “Michael,” Harley said, “Edwina Johns and Simon Seys.”

  Simon belched out an even louder laugh. “That’s really my name,” he said to Michael. “Can you believe my parents named me that? I’m just lucky they didn’t name me Yadont.”

  Michael squeezed a smile into the chorus of guffaws. “I’m pleased to meet you,” he said.

  “I like your paintings,” Eddie said abruptly, sitting in the chair that had been Harley’s. She looked at Michael’s eyes, seeming to get too close, yet they were separated by the table. “Your paintings remind me of my work.”

  “Sumiko tells me you’re a writer,” Michael said.

  “Yes.” She was not laughing now, but looking at Michael with a serious expression.

  Michael looked to Simon. “What do you do, Simon?”

  “I’m a physician,” Simon said. “A dermatologist. I just thought I’d squeeze that in.” He laughed again and the rest laughed with him.

  “Are you two from Laramie?” Michael asked.

  “No, we’re from Denver,” Eddie said, serious once more.

  Michael’s heart sank at hearing the word Denver and the word dermatologist together. He figured that all skin doctors in Denver must know one another. Simon must know Bob and therefore, these two people, if not all four of them, were probably all too familiar with the details of Michael’s private life.

  “Where do you live?” Eddie asked, accepting the glass of wine Harley handed her, but keeping her eyes on Michael.

  “I’m kind of floating these days,” he said.

  “Floating,” Simon said and he lifted his arms like a ballerina and pretended to float about the kitchen. “I’m floating. I’m a feather on the wind.”

  Sumiko danced with him.

  “I’m too big to float,” Harley said.

  Eddie still studied Michael, sipped her wine. “That’s what I try to express in my writing. That floating.” She put down her glass and gestured, making circles with her limp hands.

  Michael nodded to her as if he understood and that made her smile at him. He watched her trace the rim of her glass with her finger.

  “You should have seen the rain we drove through on the way up here,” Eddie said, breaking away from Michael.

  “Not just rain,” Simon said, starting to break into a chuckle again. “It was hail getting here.”

  “Hail?” Sumiko said.

  “Not bad,” Eddie said.

  “The hail you say,” said Simon.

  Harley’s and Sumiko’s laughter had wound down into smiles and Michael could sense that Eddie was irritated.

  “Why is it,” Simon asked, “that hail is always the size of grapefruit or baseballs and never the size of hail?” He laughed more softly, his sounds twisting into the rather sad silence that had come over the room.

  “Let’s eat,” Sumiko said.

  “By all means,” Eddie said.

  Harley and Sumiko expertly herded their guests into the dining room. A glass-topped table stood on an expanse of tan carpet, the wrought-iron legs curved down and back under, and pressed into the nap of the wool. Harley sat Michael beside Eddie with their backs to the wall farthest from the door to the kitchen. Simon sat opposite them. Harley and Sumiko sat at each end of the oval.

  The soup was good, Michael t
hought, but then he was terribly hungry and the taste of anything would have served as a distraction from his headache. He could still see and feel the white light of the bathroom.

  “So, how’s the skin trade?” Harley asked Simon.

  “Very good,” Eddie said.

  “Oh, he’s been waiting to use that all week,” Sumiko said. “So, it’s not as spontaneous as he would have you believe.”

  “Put in my place again,” Harley said, sounding a little irritated.

  Michael felt his mouth opening. He was talking only because, as a guest, he was supposed to say something at some point and he said, “I’d call that Dylan off the bottom.”

  Eddie, Simon, Harley, and Sumiko looked at him without speaking. They seemed puzzled.

  Michael felt compelled to explain. “Dylan Thomas wrote Adventures in the Skin Trade.”

  “Oh, yes,” Eddie said.

  Everyone laughed.

  Eddie looked at Michael with her serious face again and held his eyes just a second too long.

  “So how is business?” Harley put the question to Simon once more.

  “Breaking out all over,” Simon said and laughed.

  Harley chuckled politely. Eddie shifted in her chair. Sumiko sipped her wine.

  “Business is good,” Simon said.

  “How’s the writing?” Harley asked Eddie.

  “I have a story coming out next month. A little journal out of Seattle.”

  “Great.” Harley or Sumiko.

  “What kind of things do you write?” Michael asked. “Or is that a stupid question to ask a writer?”

  “I’m more interested in tonal columns and color than story,” Eddie said. “I’m into texture and contexture. I’m interested in the way opposites fit together, the way they interlock.” She took a sip of wine and licked the corners of her lips.

  Michael nodded and looked at the others.

  “I love your work,” Sumiko said to Eddie.

  “How do you think of your art?” Eddie asked Michael. “What are you exploring these days?”

  “Same as always,” Michael said. “I like colors. Sometimes I like yellows. Sometimes blues.”

  They ate without speaking for a while. The only sounds were the soft dipping of spoons into puddles of cream of eggplant soup, the parting of soup-moistened lips, the clinking of spoon handles against the rims of bowls. The sounds grew louder and louder in Michael’s head, especially the smacking of Eddie’s lips as she sneaked glances at him.