by Raven Black
Brian kept his head down, but his bad eye wandered.
The boys were nearing the corner where Brian turned. His house sat one away. Picket fence, flower box, Herringbone brick pavers to the front door. Sweet, simple, refuge.
To prevent a possible confrontation with Brian’s mom, Doug made one last remark. “You’re a complete freak.” Then ran by Brian, giving his shoulder a shove. Brian briefly stopped to gain his balance, turned and watched the three trot down the sidewalk in single order. Skip, a distant third.
Brian then noticed Andy Schaffer on his bike on the other corner to his left waiting for the light change and observing the teasing. Andy left the menacing montage months ago. Why Andy went rogue from the bunch was unsure. No sense analyzing a positive. Brian made the turn home and kept walking.
The traffic stopped at the intersection, a tinkling of a bike chain, and then Andy rolled his bike to Brian’s side. “Hi.”
“Hi.” Brian lowered his head again. Twenty steps he’d be home.
Andy pedaled slowly to keep at Brian’s pace, standing straight to achieve it. “Skip and Will might stop being mean, but Doug…well…he’s an ass.” Andy looked around as if his mom, two miles away through an open window, tuned up her supermom ears to catch his curse word. He waited for the scream to get home. It didn’t happen.
Brian stopped, mainly in disbelief, partly to absorb a hint of friendliness. “What?”
Andy braked and straddled his bike. “Skip and Will. One of these days they’ll see how mean they’re being. Well, hopefully. Doug knows how mean he’s being and loves it. Nothing will stop him. He’d be mean in jail. ‘Cept then, someone will be meaner.”
Pause.
Then Andy continued. “Sorry. In the past I’ve been so mean to ya. You don’t deserve it. No one does.”
Speechless, Brian nodded a thank you.
“My little brother, Tad, has started talking with a lisp. Kids mock him.”
“Sorry.”
Andy returned the nod.
“Doug’s meanness goes deep. He goes out to Camp Phister…do you know Camp Phister? Boy Scouts used the cabin for retreats a few years ago.”
Brian turned to his house. “It sits a half mile from my back door.”
Andy gazed over as if looking through the building, past the ravine, into the woods, and seeing the small log cabin. “Yeah! Doug goes and tries to find birds nests to steal the eggs and smash them. Worse yet, he traps squirrels in a cage using snickers and takes them back to his garage. Don’t know what he does with them, but the neighbors hear awful screeching. Police have even been called.”
“How disgusting.”
“Ever go to Camp?” Andy asked.
“Nah.” Shuffling foot, blurred vision. Not a hikers dream. Club foot, one in a thousand. So was catching a fly ball at Yankee stadium. That didn’t occur. Didn’t happen at the minor league game either. One in a hundred. Odds only worked against Brian.
“Gotta go. See ya around.” Andy pedaled off, standing and swaying the tires to and fro.
“Yeah, see ya.” Brian called and waved to Andy’s back, lost in the enthusiasm of banter and not barrage.
Entering the house, Brian’s mom stood at the sink dunking objects in water and placing them in a wire container to dry. For three weeks the knick-knacks were feather dusted, the fourth week dipped and cleansed.
Though this gave the illusion of finicky housekeeping, the ritual was limited to two Limoges vases with lids. All other items and shelves displayed ‘we’re not having company’ complacency. Clearly, the expensive 19th century look didn’t mesh with gritty Americana circa 1990. But next to Brian, the Limoges vases were her most prized treasure.
“Hi Sweetie.” A brief look, wink, and she returned to the delicate porcelain. The lapse exposed her deep love for him. Hundreds of dollars in her slippery hands, and she visually greeting him. “Did you have a good day, dear?” An invitation to sit down and talk conveyed. Sometimes it worked, sometimes it didn’t. As Brian got older ‘the didn’t’ outnumbered the ‘worked’.
“It was alright. I’m going to go to my room.”
“I’ll let you know when supper is about ready. Do your homework, sweetie.”
He wasn’t good at following directions. Without a response, he opened the door to his bedroom. The door always remained shut. Whether he was inside or out--- shut. No lock was installed, just the message of privacy. The request for respect. Honoring the message, instead of enforcing it, held the highest level of regard.
Brian flopped on the bed, put his hands behind his head, and stared at the poster on the wall. An average tree in an average forest with average shrubs, leaves, a stream of sunshine breaking the tree line like laser beams from ten rifles. Of course, that was to the average eye. But the poster came from a Mud Man comic book. Special collector’s edition. $14.95 compared to $6.95.
To a simpleton, the sturdy Oak in the background with a brown textured base, multiple knots, housing a large hanging oriole nest embraced the peacefulness of the forest. In the lush mix of fluctuating green were the red and white of high bush cranberry, winterberry, and red-osier dogwood. Beauty and bounty. Growing wild, feeding its inhabitants, and asking for nothing but respect. I think I shall never see a poem as lovely as a tree.
To a trained eye, and connoisseur of Mud Man memorabilia, such as Brian, Mud Man disguises himself to protect defenseless nature. Stop the killing, halt the butchering, contain the fire, and mind the trash.
Mud Man had metamorphosed into the mud packed, twig laden nest hanging from the oak. At different moments he was the mud covering the roots, the soil enriching the hardwoods, and the clearing seen but not crossed by hikers. Batman drove a car, Superman flew, Spiderman climbed buildings, and all had alternate lives. Mud Man had one objective, one motive, and visitors to nature had only one directive. His motto, I think I shall never see an encroacher at a tree.
Brian didn’t care if some considered Mud Man comic book violent, morbid, graphically poetic. Mud Man only harmed those doing harm. He’d consume them into land, to be useful. The mutant evil human element, transformed into a resource of nature.
Questions rose within him, if the end justified the means. Certainly not to his Limoges-vases-cleaning mother. Brian hid the books in folders marked ‘Sixth Grade Science’. Fearing courses of dissection, his mother didn’t investigate. Academics or leisure, she abhorred animal experiments. Cringed spraying the house of ant repellent. They were living creatures. The sentiment, a shared gene. However, Brian found one species warranted dissection.
He retrieved the latest issue of ‘Mud Man’. Eerily, Mud Man smiled clinging to a tree, one tree out of dozens, in the mysterious climate of high sunlight and low fog.
Each particle reaching to overtake the other. A twisted version of Waldo.
In the hazy battle, only a smidgeon of teeth by the top gum line flashed ivory. Only the outside corners of the sclera peeked from the bark. Easily dismissed as fungus, insect infestation, or ‘muddled’ effects of vapor, intruders trample the grounds in his midst. Unaware.
Unafraid.
“I see you,” whispers Brian.
Then a knock at the door. Though slow on his feet, Brian’s hand moved with a magician’s quickness. The comic book sliding under the bed covers as if a white rabbit sprang from the cloth.
“Yes?”
“Honey, a box came for you. May I come in?” Again, respect is granted for entrance.
“Yes, mom. Come on in.”
She entered. In her hand, a box which might have contained a medium pizza. It did not. Stored an array CD’s. It did not. Or a framed piece of artwork. Another negative.
His body language delivered a powerful blast of excitement. Popping from the bed, arms outstretched, vision locked, he accepted the box, demanded the box, as a mother longing for her first child. Nurse, pass me my baby.
“What have you ordered, Brian?” The label read ‘MMM-- Read directions carefully.’
�
�It’s…it’s for a school project. Extra credit. Very intricate.”
“Okay. But be careful. The label says to read the instructions carefully. Be sure to mind the directions.”
“Yes, mom. I’ll be careful.” He was never one to follow directions.
As his mother left and the door latched, two of the four taped sides of the box had been ripped from the cardboard. The other two stuck as if glued, forcing time and consideration to the content.
Gathering scissors from the desk drawer, he lightly cut the tape holding the box closed. With the final strap of concealment severed, a loud snap commanded the room. If the lid of Aladdin’s lamp had lifted, smoke and a jeweled turban would stand before Brian presenting three wishes. Alas, it did not. Nor did enchantment or a dancing girl. Instead, a weight loomed.
No tissue, foam, or plastic guarded the contents. None required. If a person ordered this item, they understood the power. Torpedoes and bombs don’t have protective coating, fancy paint, stamped warnings. Neither did MMM. MUD MAN MATERIAL. Offered only once. In the Collector’s Edition. In the back—far back, behind the malarkey monkey’s tail, elephant ivory, and rabbit’s foot. Items of scourge and pestilence to Mud Man. He’d no sooner encourage the demise of nature’s habitants and ownership of animal parts and carcasses, than produce a parking lot in a field of lilies. Beauty is raw, ugliness is processed.
Six objects sat unadorned in the box. The ad as quaint and prolific as pumpkin seeds. But can everyone harvest a pumpkin? One must be diligent, watch for prickly leaves, and keep the bugs at bay.
In small, cursive print was the ad ‘Special mud, reap the benefits; explore the wild---LIMITED TIME FOR A LIMITED FEW’.
Utterly criminal the approach. Even more diabolical, the price, $9.99. Purposely, less than the special edition, much less than a monstrous electronic toy, destroying the mind with sound waves able to pop corn and instill tintinnabulation. Brian preferred the quiet scepter of cognizance. Who would ever surmise the miracle of Mud Man came in a pizza box for $9.99? Only the people who searched the quiet and found a conventicler innately concealed within the urbane. One being Brian Dunston. Mud Man Devotee.
Without an exhalation, Brian gently, removed the objects as if nuclear detonation would occur with a sudden jerk or air density change.
First, the miniature hand rake. Wood handle, metal prongs, Lilliputian gardening scale. Second, a slightly mashed paper cup, the size of a cough syrup lid, lunch bag thin, and so delicate, so obvious it’d have limited use; eye and hand contact threatened its sturdiness. Third, a wire hoop, with a 14 inch circumference and twelve thick organic cords, resembling raffia, tied tautly cross-wise outer rim to outer rim, providing a basket weave foundation for a material to be placed upon it for security and five odd, half inch long ‘leg like’ squared wires wrapped around the main circular wire. Fourth, was the material in a bag, sealed shut, as if an ordinary bologna sandwich in a Spider Man lunch box. Well, to Brian, Spider Man was ordinary; but the content of dirt with tiny sprouts made a fairy tale of bean stalks sound feasible and infantile. Why climb to meet a villain, when an ally can grow in the backyard?
The last item, under the tool, wire rim, and bag of soil, might have been the most precious of all. Ten directions. One long piece of paper, much the size of a manila envelope, supplied ten simple instructions. Simple, uncomplicated applications---like the Ten Commandments.
The ad no longer existed. Brian scanned the pages of the comic book. Poof - gone. He understood the meaning---Be thankful for the pizza box, kid. You got one slice of the pie.
Brian refused to browse the instructions. Instead, savoring one by one. Each one on its own, unique chocolate.
Number One: Lay the wire hoop near a window, unobstructed. And place attached metal wire outward.
Books, pens, notebooks, instantly were removed from the three drawer wood desk at the south window of his bedroom, and shoved in the corner with dream items gone astray: roller blades and ice skates. Laying the wire flat, the five squared attached features gave the circle a star image. Refraining from cleaning with chemicals or detergents, Brian removed his grey soccer ball printed T-shirt, turned it inside out, and wiped any residue off the surface of his desk. He stood back, bent down, and eyed the desk for dust. Nothing, except the microscopic smear of his DNA. Perfect.
Number Two: Remove dirt from bag. Spread evenly inside the wire and spread gently with rake not disturbing the netting.
If Brian had spread the soil more gently, it would not have spread.
Number Three: Let faucet run exactly three minutes at room temperature and at a slow flow.
Carefully fill enclosed cup half full.
Peeking out his room, Brian heard rattling of pots and pans. His mother was in the kitchen. A three wall barrier between them.
In the upper right dresser drawer rested a hodge- podge collection of objects. The collage signifying normality and sadness of disunion. Most items, unused. A compass, pocket knife, lighter, hankie, plastic comb, a rubber ball from a gum machine, a miniature yellow flashlight, and one baseball card, of Bob Gibson, top St. Louis pitcher in the 60’s (To Brian, he didn’t need another, until cards of Mud Man printed) and finally a stop watch.
Brian retrieved the stop watch, shoved it in his front pocket and with the cup cradled in both his hands, he maneuvered to the bathroom sink. He didn’t have to go far. Only twelve steps away in the small slab house.
Keeping the cup guarded in one hand, he spun both knobs of the faucet. One then the other, until the temperature blended into the air. He clicked the stop watch and waited.
THREE MINUTES!
With surgeon’s precision, he filled the cup.
Fearing he’d disrupt the water or rip the cup, he kept the water running and returned to his room.
Number four: Dribble on dirt covering entire area. Rake gently not disturbing netting.
The pounding of his heart entered his throat and caused a tightness fighting a tickle. Pure will denounced a cough, sniff, or swallow in close proximity to the dirt. Must not contaminate. Must not contaminate.
Number four was over. He stepped back five feet. Took a breath. Swallowed, and scratched his neck leaving three red marks chin to Adam’s apple. He glanced at the directions, but only the next one. Number five would be murder. Why did the word pop? He hated that word. It alluded to evil. He preferred defeat.
Number Five: Wait twenty-four hours.
He’d defeat twenty-four hours. A call to supper resonated. If questions to the dirt arose, it was merely a project. Certainly, not a lie.
Shuffling to the bathroom, he shut the water off. A crooked smile formed as his lazy eye widened. He then consumed a hearty meal of beef stew and large slice of Mississippi mud pie. How fitting.
Living in dog years, twenty-four hours turned into a week. Teachers babbled, his mother whined, and yet the teasing on the playground twisted into a level of unconcern.
Resolved tranquility by looking ahead and ignoring the present. No issues, no fretting. Brian was onto direction number six.
He read number six twice.
Number Six: Gently raise the wire and engage the five attachments as a stand allowing air under the wire.
In the quiet of the room, his brain played band music. Mostly, trumpet and tuba.
Done.
Number Seven: Carefully repeat numbers three, four, and five.
His head pounded--Are you kidding? Torture. Mental torture. What was at stake? At the worst, residence in an institution muttering in Latin, though never learned. Eating springs on a bed, never realizing they’re non-digestible, and dancing with a rat named Delilah, which unfortunately does exist. He’d watched a documentary on insane asylums. But really, how different is it for a gimp, cross-eyed, potty pants thrown into a classroom, an arena of sorts, of salivating gladiators.
At best, a test of patience. A test of competence. How bad did he want the reward? Mud Man expects no less. If he couldn’t obey, why waste his time? Th
e Pyramids, the Coliseum, the Taj Mahal, are not only structures of intelligence and endurance, but devotion. Devotion. Devotion.
He followed Number Seven, not reading number eight. Don’t look ahead. Don’t presume. He never pondered the use of the five attachments. Never guessed the why’s and what fors. He’d just follow faithfully.
Only a few instructions remained.
Talk about bladder restraint, excitement pushed his organs to the max. He saw it. Immediately entering his bedroom after school, he saw it. After two harassing recesses and a drawn out lunch, where his apricot and grape jelly sandwich was taken, tossed about, and stomped on until the jelly overtook the bread, he saw it. Sprouts.
Tossing his book bag, he went to the window, dipped and inspected the wire. Roots were growing. Not from the top, but from underneath in the space. Growth. Roots reaching for ground, nutrients, life. His bladder expanded, he quickly went to the restroom, washed, wrung and sanitized his hands, and swiftly returned running his finger to number eight.
Number Eight: Carefully pick up wire and plant outside root down in healthy soil, partial sun.
For the first time since reading the directions, he curiously jumped ahead to the next instructions before finishing the prior.
Number Nine: Leave alone for twenty-four hours.
Twenty-four hours now seemed inadequate for what was to occur. Twenty-four hours. So close to success. So close to failure. So close to knowing. But he did know. And optimism grew with the sprouts.
Before he picked up the wire, he retreated five steps. Like a pre-game warm-up, confidence builder, cheer squad chat, he took a breath, swallowed, and scratched his neck leaving three red marks, chin to Adam’s apple. Some might call the routine a nervous affliction; Brian stuck with a winning game plan. Only his opinion mattered. As he stared at the roots, he reassessed. Mud Man and his. He reassessed again, returning to one opinion mattered. MUD MAN.
Luck (or Mud Man) was on Brian’s side. He heard paper rumple, his mother go into the bathroom, and the door shut. Reading material, probably the newspaper.
Meaning: A lengthy stay. Even with his slow pace, slower now that he was carrying precious material, he’d make it out the door before questions were asked.