“Smoke on the Water” finished, the Marching Wildcat Band reprises “Louie, Louie.” The Singing Doves clap in time and sing the only words anybody knows: “Lou-eeeea, Loooo-i, ohhhh no! I godda go.”
13
Howie Dornick is curled up in his bed listening to Katherine Hardihood’s whispery librarian’s snore when the pling-plingy-plong of the door bell echoes up through the heating ducts. He looks first at Katherine’s face—her lips pushed out like the petals of a wilting tulip—and then at the clock radio he won at the Eagles Club raffle. It’s only 8:37. Pling-plingy-plong.
He puts on his pants and goes down to the door. On the porch he finds a man with a brown and white dog under his arm. The man is tall and vegetarian thin. His hair is concentration camp short. He is maybe thirty-five. The dog is maybe the size of a Hungarian rye. “My name is Hugh Harbinger,” this man says. “I’d like to talk to you about your house.”
Suddenly Howie Dornick can feel last night’s coffee in his liver and in his Sunday morning delirium he supposes that this man has been sent by D. William Aitchbone. “I ain’t gonna repaint it.”
“Good God, I hope not,” says Hugh Harbinger. “I think it’s fabulous.”
Howie Dornick studies him more closely now. This man has beseeching eyes. This man has a hopeful smile. While he is a nervous man, there is also a listlessness about him. If D. William Aitchbone has sent this man to harass him, then clearly he has not chosen wisely. This man is no more threatening than the little rye-bread dog under his arm.
Within three minutes Howie Dornick is in the kitchen grinding expensive African coffee beans in the expensive German-made grinder Katherine Hardihood gave him for his birthday. Katherine and this man named Hugh Harbinger are sitting at the table. The rye-bread dog is running free in the living room, barking at the prosthetic foot on the mantle. “Who wants peanut butter toast?” Howie asks.
And so they eat peanut butter toast and drink freshly ground African coffee and talk first about the little dog named Matisse, then about Squaw Days, and finally the color of the house they’re sitting in.
“You see,” Hugh Harbinger explains, “I design colors.”
“I thought that was God’s job,” Katherine Hardihood cannot resist saying.
Hugh grins. He explains that he consults with companies about what colors they should make their products. Color can make or break a product, he tells them.
“And you really like the color I painted my house?” Howie Dornick asks.
“I think it’s fabulous.”
People in Tuttwyler do not say fabulous very often, not the way this Hugh Harbinger is saying it. “Where you from?” Howie asks.
The simple question opens Hugh’s soul like the key on a tin of Norwegian sardines. He confesses that he is from Parma. He confesses about his years in New York ping-ponging between advertising agencies and corporate marketing departments as a graphic artist. “I got this gig with this Mexican-owned bathroom fixture company, designing their brochures,” he says, “and this guy in R&D liked my color sense and before I knew it I was the crown prince of toilets and bidets. My reputation snow-balled overnight—in New York reputations can do that—and before I knew it I was no longer Hugh Hbracek, lowly graphic artist, but Hugh Harbinger, coveted color designer. I’ve done just about everything. Cars. Clothes. Appliances. Furniture. Paper products. Everything. Most of it high end. I’m also one of those rare birds who’s demographically versatile. Boomers. Gen-X. Ethnic. Gay. Hetero. East Coast, West Coast. Urban, Leafy. I’ve got good Euro instincts, too. I can out-Italian the Italians. The last few years before I had my breakdown—don’t worry, I’m not going to freak on you—I got into cosmetics big time. I’m responsible for that whole black thing.”
“The girl at the Daydream Beanery wears black lipstick,” Howie Dornick observes.
“No doubt one of mine. I’ve done over three hundred shades of black. A lot of the epic shades. Bullet Hole. Virtual Death. Decompose. Black Maggot Woman. They’re all mine.” Suddenly Hugh Harbinger’s mood goes black as well. He drinks half a cup of coffee before speaking again. “Then my life took the L train to Loserville. Clinical depression. Slam dunk, I’m in a funk. Now I’m just a thirty-something zeke living with his parents.”
“And you really like the color I painted my house?” Howie Dornick asks.
“I think it’s fabulous,” Hugh Harbinger assures him. “Absolutely fabulous.”
And so they finish their coffee and toast and go outside. The sun is over the treetops now and the house is shimmering. Already the traffic on South Mill is heavy. Locals are heading for church. Daytrippers are already filtering in for the third and final day of Squaw Days. “Where did you get this paint?” asks Hugh Harbinger. “I’ve never seen a green like this.”
While Howie Dornick has understood very little of his guest’s breathless confession, he feels the need to confess himself. He confesses how his house went unpainted for decades and how the president of the village council, the same evil man who’s in charge of Squaw Days now, threatened to eliminate his job as maintenance engineer if he didn’t paint it, how he drove all the way to Wooster and bought the cheapest paint he could from a kid wearing a BONE HEAD tee-shirt—the car wash-yellow and the video-store blue and the beauty shop-blue and the fraternity-house gold and the darkroom black—and mixed it together in a rusty old drum, with all kinds of other stuff—his mother’s satin-finish peach kitchen paint, the two-quart can of shellac, the jug of bleach, the floor wax and furniture polish, the rubbing alcohol, the Listerine and hydrogen peroxide from the bathroom, the six cans of 10 W-30 motor oil, the jug of windshield wiper fluid, the charcoal lighter, and the three, two-gallon containers of antifreeze. He confesses that he didn’t scrape or prime, that he painted over mold and moss, over bird shit and bugs.
“So this green color was just a serendipitous thing,” Hugh Harbinger says.
Katherine Hardihood can see that her man doesn’t know this word, serendipitous. “Out of the blue,” she says in a sort of whisper.
Howie Dornick now understands. “That’s right,” he says. “Out of the blue. And the yellow and the gold and the black and all that other stuff I dumped in. Serendipitous for sure.”
Hugh Harbinger thanks Howie Dornick for the coffee and peanut butter toast, helps Matisse wave good-bye to Katherine Hardihood, and drives off in Bob Hbracek’s cinnamon-gold Crown Vic.
The traffic on I-71 is light. Hugh Harbinger speeds northward, in the left-hand lane, as restless as the green on Howie Dornick’s clapboards, his mood dancing back and forth on the spectrum of possible human emotions. When he reaches the Hbracek’s bungalow on Delano Drive, Eleanor is grating mozzarella for a Sunday lasagna. Bob is on the sofa, watching This Old House and eating a huge bowl of Neapolitan ice cream.
Hugh goes straight to the phone in his parent’s bedroom. He starts to dial Buzzy in New York. His fingers get no farther than the area code. He flops back on the bed. He sits up and dials his psychiatrist, Dr. Pirooz Aram. He waits for the beep and leaves a message.
In the morning Dr. Pirooz Aram’s secretary calls back and an emergency appointment is made. Late the next afternoon Hugh Harbinger slumps into a comfortable leather chair. He hears the faraway flush of a toilet and a half-minute later Dr. Aram enters the office, huge hands wrapped around a fragile demitasse. “How are you, Hugh Harbinger?” He has been in the United States half his life, some thirty years, yet his accent is as obstinate as the weave in the expensive Persian rug on the floor. “Can I get you an espresso?”
Hugh hears himself answer “no.”
Dr. Aram finishes his espresso and deposits his tiny cup on the silver tray resting on the corner of his mammoth desk. He scratches his white beard and sits in his throne-like leather chair. “Caffeine is no good for a man with your problems, anyway,” he says. “Tell me, Hugh Harbinger, what is so important that I must work until 5:30 on a Monday?”
Hugh tells him about going to Squaw Days with Bob and Eleanor
Hbracek.
“You should avoid associating with those two,” Dr. Pirooz Aram says. “They will love you straight into a mental ward.”
Hugh tells him about the green house he has discovered. He tells him about the mercurial nature of its hue. He tells him how this green is tearing away at his soul.
“This must be some green,” says Dr. Aram.
Hugh goes on and on about the green, and about the man, Howie Dornick, who so serendipitously concocted it.
Dr. Pirooz Aram smiles proudly. “Did you know that this wonderful word you use—this serendipity—is taken from an old Persian fairy tale? The Three Princes of Serendip, who made wonderful discoveries by accident?”
“I didn’t know that.”
Dr. Aram frowns. “Americans do not know anything important.” Suddenly his frown somersaults into a grin. “Like all good fairy tales there are many versions of it, of course. But essentially it is about a wise king who sends his three sons into the world to perfect their educations. Even though they encounter many dangers—a three-headed snake, an evil hand as big as a mountain, a stubborn merchant who accuses them of stealing one of his camels—they always manage to stumble upon something wonderful, something serendipitous, Hugh Harbinger, that make their lives worth living—a beautiful princess, a grateful queen, a magic mirror, a bird with golden wings, a silver box that contains a poem for chasing dragons away.”
Now the doctor rubs his chocolate eyes and laughs as only a wise Persian can. “So, my good prince of Serendip, you have stumbled upon this wonderful green house. And now you make me work until 5:30 on a Monday.”
“Sorry.”
Dr. Pirooz Aram continues to laugh. “Do not feel sorry. Just hurry up and tell me what you want me to tell you! My sweet Sitareh and I are going out for fish at six.”
Hugh Harbinger feels suddenly small and numb. He wishes he had accepted that demitasse of espresso. “I’m not sure what I want you to tell me.”
Dr. Aram jumps up. “Boool-shit! You know exactly what you want me to tell you. You have come to me for permission to end your exile and take this serendipity green of yours to the world.”
Hugh no longer feels small and numb. He feels huge and his skin is prickling. “I could make the world go nuts for that color.”
“If you were not already nuts yourself?”
“Bingo.”
“Bingo, nothing. You are no longer nuts.”
Hugh Harbinger scratches his nose and laughs sardonically. “This green has cured me, has it?”
“Ah! You are a student of Avicenna!”
“Who?”
Disappointment wrinkles Dr. Aram’s face. “Let an old man from a very old country lecture you for a moment,” he says. “You are a young man from a young country, and accordingly you have never heard of anybody who does not score lots of points in some pointless game, or who does not shout obscenities into a microphone while a guitar electrocutes his fingers. Avicenna was one of the greatest scientists of all time. And naturally he was a Persian.”
“Naturally.”
Dr. Aram is not deterred by his patient’s sarcasm. “A thousand years ago this Persian wrote a book on medicine that is marveled at even today—even by American doctors who know everything and nothing. You think you are an expert on color, Mr. Hugh Harbinger? Avicenna was the expert of all experts! He not only used color to diagnose the afflictions of his patients, he used color to cure them. Potions made of red flowers cured the blood. Yellow flowers reduced pain and swelling. So when you joke that this green has cured you, you are not joking at all. Of course it has cured you! It has awakened you and transformed you, and just perhaps it will make your life worth living again.”
Hugh can feel his heartbeat in his eyes and ears and even on the end of his tongue. “So you think I should take this serendipity green to the world, do you?”
Dr. Aram closes his briefcase and clicks off the lights. He hurries his patient to the door. “It is not my job to tell you what to do. It is my job to help you get back to a place where you can tell yourself what to do. As much as I enjoy-taking your money, Hugh Harbinger, I’m afraid this green has interfered with the lengthy and expensive treatment I had planned for you. Admit it, you knew you were going to take this color to the world the second you saw it.”
“I guess so.”
Dr. Aram explodes with affection. “Do not guess! Know, dammit! Know!” He hurries Hugh to the parking lot. “Now that you are no longer my patient, would you like to join Sitareh and me for some fish?”
Hugh is too excited to eat fish and he drives off in the Crown Vic.
Dr. Pirooz Aram drives off in a sports car so red that even the mullahs now ruling his homeland would be forced to praise God for Western technology.
“Buzzy? It’s Hugh.”
“Hugh! How the hell—”
“Listen, Buzzy. I’ve got a fabulous new color.”
“That’s fabulous.”
“You’ve got to do a show for me.”
“Yum! How soon?”
“ASAP.”
“Where’s the bread coming from? You’re not the only one who’s a penniless wretch these days.”
“Zee Levant, I suppose.”
“Zee’s still talking to you?”
“I don’t know yet.”
“You left us all high and dry, Hugh.”
“Easy on the guilt. I’m clinically depressed, remember.”
“All’s forgiven if this color is as fabulous as you say.”
“Oh, it is.”
“Hugh Harbinger rides again!”
“I’ll be in New York in three, maybe four days. Okay if I sleep on your couch?”
“No problemo.”
“So, Buzzy, do you see Zee much?”
“Every once.”
“She sleeping with anybody?”
“Not with anybody of your gender, I don’t think.”
“Good. Now you book some wacky spot for a show. And start lining up models. All boys, Buzzy. Masculine, Wall Street types.”
“We’re breaking this fabulous color of yours on boys in business suits? Boooor-ringgggg!”
“Boring, my ass. Start sketching some thirties and forties Cary Grant stuff. As conservative as your trashy little mind can manage. Cuffs. Hats. Vests. Industrial-strength lapels. And overcoats, Buzzy. Big-ass overcoats.”
“Whatever you say. Youz da boss.”
“Just keep telling yourself that and I’ll be at your door with the most fabulous green you’ve ever seen.”
“Green?”
“Green.”
“But Hugh, green is so ambiguous.”
“Bingo, Buzzy. Green is ambiguous. And my green is the most ambiguous green on God’s green earth. And if there’s one thing I’m sure about, it’s that New York loves ambiguity. Green is refreshing. Green is quieting and peaceful. Optimistic. Green is life. But green is also the color of greed and envy and fear and death. Ambiguity out the wazoo, Buzzy. Every clothes horse in the city will go gaga for serendipity green. You can take that to the bank.”
“Serendipity green?”
“Just start drawing, Buzzy.”
Red.
Yellow.
D. William Aitchbone bullies through the intersection at South Mill and Tocqueville before the light turns green. His CD of Yobisch Podka’s Insipientia, uplifting as it is, has not chiseled a single chip out of his foul granite mood. “That bastard,” he curses over the electrified violins, meaning, of course, Howie Dornick. “That woman has more brass than a marching band,” he curses over the electrified oboes and French horns, meaning, of course, Katherine Hardihood. He drives right past his impressive soapy white Queen Anne—Karen, Amy and Cannon Aitchbone patiently waiting inside for their supper—and pulls into the driveway of the impressive soapy white Gothic of former Tuttwyler mayor Donald Grinspoon.
“For a man who’s just put one of the best Squaw Days ever to bed, you don’t look very happy,” Donald Grinspoon says to his protégé when they
are seated across from each other at the dining room table, sipping warm 7UP.
“Who you kidding, Donald, the entire festival was a disaster,” Aitchbone says to his mentor. “A goddamn disaster.” He brings up the Ferris wheel first: “After all my preaching, that idiot Kevin Hassock let the Happy Landing Ride Company bring the small one. I hope his company downsizes his ass all the way back to North Carolina.”
“I liked the small Ferris wheel,” Donald says. “It goes a lot faster than the big one. I rode it four times.”
D. William Aitchbone brings up the cupcake: “I told Dick Mueller not to let Darren Frost march in the parade as the cupcake again. We’ve got to get that snack cake shit behind us.”
“Everybody loves the cupcake,” Donald says.
D. William Aitchbone brings up Ernest Not Irish: “And that asshole Indian with the I’M A REAL INDIAN sign. What was that all about, anyway?”
“It’s a free country,” Donald points out.
D. William Aitchbone brings up moving the tobacco-spitting contest to Saturday: “Big mistake, Donald. There were six fewer contestants. And the winning spit was the third shortest on record.”
“I know,” Donald Grinspoon says sadly. “I was sure we’d set a new record this year. But, what the hell.”
D. William Aitchbone brings up Interior Secretary Danley McCutcheon: “I never told you about this, Donald, but that was supposed to be the Vice President! Victoria Bonobo and I went all the way to Washington to see him.”
Donald grins like someone passing gas on a crowded bus. “Everybody figured you two were off diddling.”
Aitchbone puckers sourly. “The VP promised to come. We shook hands on it. He had his aide take notes on it. Then the day before I’m going to announce it, his aide calls and says the Interior Secretary is coming instead. I could have crawled under a rock.”
“Well, it was nice that Secretary McCutcheon stayed long enough to judge the pie-eating contest,” Donald Grinspoon says. “I doubt the Vice President would’ve done that.”
Aitchbone stands up and puts his hands in his pockets, jingling the quarters he always carries for the meters outside the court house in New Waterbury. He strolls to the hutch and studies the rows of antique English plates. “And that goddamn green house! Did you see the crowd? They skirted that goddamn house like it was a huge block of radioactive limburger cheese. I’d like to shove that goddamn green house right up Howie Dornick’s goddamn ass. Sweet Jesus, I would!”
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