The Battered Suitcase July 2008

by Battered Suitcase

  Fuck you! I scream, pounding the walls with my fists, with my shoulder, with my head, with whatever part of my body happens to be available. Why don't you take your own fucking advice? Why don't you fuck off and die? Why don't you-

  When I start to scream and beat the walls like this, I often attract visitors. My room is suddenly invaded with soothing voices and manufactured concern. One moment I'm a sacrificial lamb; the next I'm the most important person in the whole wide world, the focus of everyone's attention. And, after I've calmed down - can't stay angry or upset forever - or been forcibly calmed, I get another kind of visit. This time from someone who really enjoys the art of conversation, who really likes to hear herself gab. It's the only explanation I can find for this frumpy middle-aged woman who sits on the edge of my bed, hands folded across her lap, and talks a mile a minute, seemingly about nothing at all. About any subject that comes to mind. I think of my friend in the long black coat and the silences we created between us. The intimate silences where words became irrelevant and contact all that really mattered. I think of the fact I'm no longer there. No, he's the one who's no longer there and I'm here. So that means I'm no longer there either. But I wouldn't be there even if I was. Not without him there. Not without his comforting presence beside me. Not after he's flown away. That's where it becomes confusing. That's where I want to curl up against the wall again and sleep forever. But this woman with the sweet, well-scrubbed, oval-shaped face won't let me. She insists on talking as quickly as possible. On leaving no gaps between the words and sentences. And even worse, she insists I also talk.

  "Freely," she says. "What you say won't leave this room. That's a promise. Your words will stay right here - and in my heart."

  I look around the room, searching for an escape route: if the words won't leave, maybe I can. No such luck. There's only one way out - a locked and bolted steel door. Now, she wants me to express my feelings. To let it all hang out and tell her what I feel inside.

  I feel nothing, I tell her, not wanting to complicate matters. Or perhaps because I'm not in the habit of divulging the state of my emotions to total strangers. Even if they do have sweet faces and soft voices and bodies that give off the faint scent of lilac.

  She doesn't accept that answer. Instead, she keeps right at me, trying to pry me open with her crowbar words. Now, she wants to know my background, where I come from, my loves, my hates, my fears, my fantasies.

  Telling her about my background and where I come from is easy: I don't know. I haven't a clue. As for my loves, hates, fears and fantasies, those come under the category of "feelings" last time I looked - so they're none of her business.

  She picks up on my 'I don't know'.

  "You don't know?" she says. "You don't know where you come from? I shake my head. And you don't know who you are? You don't know your name?"

  "Giulio," I say, wondering what that has to do with anything. "That's my name. That's what it says on the name tag anyway."

  "Yes, Giulio," she says, her face all earnestness. "That's your name. We've established that much. It says that on the door. But who are you?"

  I shrug and pull away from her, edging as far back on the bed as possible. Maybe she'll go away if she sees I'm not interested in talking to her, in telling her any secrets. I push back so far my head makes contact with the wall.

  Tell her who you are, the scratching says from behind me, from just behind my left earlobe. Tell her you're a sacrificial lamb. You're being fattened as an offering to the common good. You're being led up to the high, windswept altar where dry tinder awaits and the flames will engulf you, the flames will purify you so that others may live. Why else would they feed you and clothe you and change your bed sheets every morning? Why else would they treat you like a pampered pasha in his mountain kingdom? Why else would they send someone to pretend she really cares about you when you know - ?

  I break contact and lurch forward again, almost falling into her lap. She pats my head and begins to speak in a singsong voice, a voice designed to lull the listener to sleep. Or into divulging everything, disgorging secrets like a cat bringing up chewed grass.

  "Let me be your guide," she says. "Let me help you out of the wilderness. Let me bring you to someplace warm and inviting where you'll finally understand who you are. Let me be the one to make you whole again."

  I feel trapped. Which one should I believe? Which one is more likely to be telling the truth? Let's see. One wants to sacrifice me; one wants to save me. One claims to be my mentor; the other my tormentor. The choice should be easy, shouldn't it? No one in their right mind would take sacrifice over salvation. Unless, of course, one precedes the other. That would make both of them right, wouldn't it? Or maybe they're both wrong. Maybe there's a third path that neither of them wants me to see because they don't know enough about it themselves. Or, selfish creatures that they are, they want to keep it for themselves. It's been known to happen.

  "Go away," I say. "Both of you. I don't care who I am. I don't want to know. Just go away and leave me in peace."

  I cover my head and roll myself into a ball. A tiny, tight ball lying between this woman and the wall. I won't listen to either of them if I can help it. I won't give either of them the satisfaction. Cutting off the scratching sounds is easy - I just stay away from direct contact with the wall. The woman is another matter. Despite my efforts to drown her out, she continues to speak in that droning voice of hers. And I'm too tired to stop her. She talks for half the night. Chanting. Repeating words that make no sense to me. At one point, she tries to tell me how the world began: on a strange, back-lit evening just like this. On the back of a turtle, she says. But I don't believe her. I know better. The world didn't begin, I want to tell her, because the world doesn't exist. Turtle or no turtle. It just isn't there. See. You think it's all solid and healthy and nutritious - but you can poke your finger right through it. Can make it come apart with one silly question. Or it's all a big joke and you're the butt of that joke. That's what I want to tell her but I don't have the energy. I just don't have the strength to say anything. And she wouldn't understand anyway. What do you mean, she'd say. Look I stub my toe against this bedpost, I'll cry out in pain, won't I? So I don't say anything.

  She, on the other hand, continues to talk non-stop. She talks so much my stomach begins to cramp. Tighter and tighter. Harder and harder. Muscles contracting and pulling everything else with them. Until I can't stand the pain any longer. Until the pressure of holding it in is too much. With a loud explosion, I soil myself. I let go and feel the soft, hot detritus fill my pajama trousers, spreading out in all directions, wet and clammy and full of childhood memories. Maybe that'll drive her away. Maybe the stench will be too much for her and she'll retreat. Or she'll be overcome with a wave of utter disgust for this sub-human creature before her. This befouler of his own nest.

  For a moment, the plan seems to be working. Her sweet face twists and scrunches up, going from oval to eccentric. She places a handkerchief over her nose and hurries away from the bed, retreating close to the door. But it's only a tactical retreat, a temporary setback, a pause before marshalling her forces. She's only moving out of the way so that the sheet changers can charge in. Four of them this time, all practically identical, all marching in step. One pair lift me up, gingerly, one under each arm, and carry me to the nearby shower stall. There, on the cool ceramic floor, I'm stripped and hosed down, the foecal matter dissolving under the spray of sudsy water. At the same time, the other pair busy themselves with my bed: rolling the dirty sheets into a ball and replacing them with crackling duplicates that snap into place with a slingshot sound. Within a few minutes, everything is bright and clean again - and smelling of Lysol. The men troop out, hauling away the last traces of my inappropriate behavior. I follow them with infinite longing, wishing they'd haul me away, too. Wishing I, too, could be wrapped up in a ball and tossed into an industrial washing machine. The woman smiles as she sits again on my bed. As she smoothes out a wrinkle that only she
sees. She smiles because she knows I've been defeated. She knows that I've done my best. Or worst. And it didn't work. She knows.

  "Once upon a time," she begins, "in a world very much like this one - in a world exactly like this one - there lived a... what? Coyote? Crow? Bear? Blue jay? Wolf? Wishing well?"

  She looks at me, her eyes suddenly reflective pools where my fear and longing can easily be fathomed.

  "Help me now," she says. "I know you can do it if you put your mind to it. We all can. There lived a... a what?"

  "A man," I say, feeling as if the words were being ripped out of me. As if the deep tendrils were being ripped out and hauled up through my throat.

  "Yes!" she says, clapping her hands. "A man. Bravo! There lived a man. A man as in a member of the male gender of the species. And this man's name was... come on now... work with me on this... this man's name was...?"

  "Giulio," I say, my voice no louder than a mouse's squeak, no more certain than a child held under his mother's thumb.

  But it doesn't matter to her. She's beaming now, grinning from ear to ear. She's happy now. She knows that, once she has me talking like any ordinary human being, my salvation can't be very far behind. At least, if she has anything to do with it.

  "See how easy it is," she says as she places her hand on my knee. It's warm even through the cotton pyjamas. "If you put your mind to it, that is. Once you accept that you're not alone and that others can help you. That others are there for you when you need them. It's the easiest thing in the whole world, isn't it? Almost as easy as apple pie - if not quite as tasty. Hah, hah."

  I'm about to smile along with her, hoping to get into her good books, when she suddenly becomes very serious - to the point of scowling.

  "Your story," she says, pushing her face right up against mine, almost as if trying to mimic some form of sexual intensity which she couldn't otherwise feel.

  Or maybe it has nothing to do with sexual intensity. Maybe she sincerely wants to help me discover who I really am.

  "Tell me your story," she says, her eyes locked on mine. "Please. I need to hear it. And it'll make you feel better, too. Promise."

  I lean back against the wall, hoping for inspiration. Or for anything really: My name is Mary Jane and I live down the lane. What's my number? Cucumber. Come on, come on, I say to myself. Think of something. Something a little more original.

  Riverrun, the scratching whispers, past Eve and Adam's...

  "Riverrun," I repeat, staring intently into the woman's dreamy, hypnotized face. "Past Eve and Adam's, from swerve of shore to bend of bay..."

  And then 628 pages later, the woman asleep, my lips parched, the scratching whispers still going strong: Given! A way alone a last a loved a long the...

  "The end," I say when I realize there's no more, when I sense the scratching is about to start all over again and I don't want to be forced to give the real ending away. Not to her anyway.

  ~

  Some time afterwards (I'm not really sure how long), the woman leads me outside into the bright sunlight. I presume it's the same woman, although I have no way of knowing really as everyone looks pretty much the same: bright-eyed and oval-faced. She leads me outside by the arm and I stumble like someone no longer used to walking.

  "You're free," she says, "free to rejoin your friends." And letting go my arm, launches me towards the street with a gentle push.

  I turn to thank her but the sun blinds me and, by the time I'm able to focus again, she's gone - only the click of the self-reflecting double doors as they shut left to indicate there was anyone there in the first place. I look down at my feet instead. At least, they've returned my clothes to me, I say to myself. Even if they are starched and stiff and make me feel like a zombie. And my good old bag with the name tag on it, the tag that identifies me. I stand there, unsure of where to go next. From around the corner comes a man on a motorcycle. He screeches to a halt in front of me, the bike slipping slightly sideways before he manages to regain control of it. I don't recognize him at first - what with his helmet on and all. But the moment he gets off the bike and starts walking towards me, I know exactly who it is. I drop my bag and rush into his arms.

  "You didn't leave me," I say, face pressed to his chest. He nods. "You waited all this time for me?" He nods again. And takes out a sign: Come on. You've been in this world too long. Time to get back to the real one.

  He hands me a spare helmet. I slide it on my head, climb onto the back of the bike and hang on tight.

  Michael Mirolla is a Toronto, Canada, novelist, short story writer, poet and playwright. Publications include a novel-The Boarder-and two short story collections-The Formal Logic of Emotion and Hothouse Loves & Other Tales. His short story, "A Theory of Discontinuous Existence," was selected for The Journey Prize Anthology, featuring the ten top short stories published in Canadian literary journals in the previous year, while another short story, "The Sand Flea," has been nominated for the Pushcart. His novel The Boarder can be found at https://www.redleadbooks.com/boarder.html and other works at https://www.fictionwise.com/

  Poetry by Kat Lillian Steiger

  Tap

  Little birch

  branch

  weave;

  v. having moved from side to side while going forward

  along headboard - threaded between

  rungs;

  n. a rounded crosspiece between the legs (of a chair)

  as tight and loose as a child's

  cross-stitch.

  This is how

  we begin

  to tap;

  n. 1. a. spigot 1. b. faucet 2. a. liquor drawn through a tap 2. b. the procedure

  of removing fluid (as from a body cavity) 3. a tool for forming an internal screw

  thread 4. an intermediate point in an electric circuit where a connection may be

  made 5. wiretap

  into each

  other.

  Beside,

  between;

  prep. 1. the common action of 2. in the time, space or interval that separates

  3.a. from one to another of 3.b. serving to connect or unite in a relationship

  3.c. setting apart 4. in preference for one or the other of 5. in confidence

  restricted to 6. taking together the combined effect of

  we take

  awhile.

  There are

  many well-received

  distractions;

  n. mental confusion

  Just before

  the last

  rub;

  v. applied pressure and friction to (something) with a circular or backwards -

  and forwards movement

  the little limbs grip

  almost as tender

  and troubled

  as had

  their

  roots.

  definition references: https://www.merriam-webster.com/

  Kat Lillian Steiger graduated from Emerson College's undergraduate Writing, Literature and Publishing program in 2000. At that time she co-edited the on campus literary magazine The Emerson Review, was an Editorial Assistant at Ploughshares and received the college's Best Poetry Evvy Award in 2000. She also has poetry published or forthcoming in Della Donna: A Webzine for Women, The Big Toe Review and Beeswax Magazine. She currently lives in Leipzig, Germany and teaches at the Leipzig International School.

  Perceptive Norm

  Malachey

  Norman was tootling happily along on his moped one crisp and sunny morning when the entire world suddenly flipped like a pancake. The poor fellow nearly crashed as everything rolled 180 degrees, so that the tarmac road took the place of the sky and the sky ended up on the floor.

  "Stone me!" he exclaimed as he wobbled his moped to the side of the road. "What's happening here?"

  He dismounted unsteadily and struggled to remove his helmet before it got wedged, for the blood was already rushing to his head, swelling it and turning his cheeks crimson.

&n
bsp; He took a look around, beginning to feel nauseous, and sure enough everything was now upside down; he was dangling by his feet from the road, which was now a ceiling, with his floppy hair standing on end and clouds passing underneath him. Cars drove past stuck to the road, trees held onto the grass verge by their roots and an upside down paperboy cycled by on his upside down bike. The whole thing was like some incredible superglue joke, but more than that, because apart from his hair and his blood, gravity had reversed too. He experimented by holding out his helmet and letting go and saw with mounting fear that instead of dropping into the sky, it flew up and hit the road with a crack. This is insane, he thought, the whole world has flipped!

  There was no time to ponder the unusual turn of events at that moment though, because his eyes were beginning to bulge from the pressure. Bright lights assailed his vision like red carpet flashbulbs and his ears rang loudly, throbbing to the beat of his heart. It was becoming quite unbearable just standing there and he knew if he didn't do something soon he, would pass out, so he tried bending forward at the waist and tucking in his chin. Sure enough this alleviated the roaring in his ears and the paparazzi retreated somewhat. Experimenting further, he found if he stood with his head between his legs (and thus the right way up) and hugged his knees, the symptoms were altogether better and his lovely locks flopped back down around his ears.

  Norman remained at the side of the road like this for several minutes wondering what to do next, but it was all rather harrowing. He was generally a shy, unassuming fellow and the compromising position he had arrived at left him a trifle embarrassed. His flea-bitten Blues Explosion t-shirt had joined the gravity revolt and gathered under his armpits, exposing his hairy alabaster paunch. His trousers, which were a little on the baggy side, had slipped to reveal two inches of underpant (not in a cool hip hop way - they were not cool hip hop underpants) and about four inches of densely hairy arse-crack. As a result a he was effectively standing in the road and mooning the public. He frowned unhappily as he felt the morning breeze tickle his bum fuzz and, between his knees, he saw a young woman walking her children to school yelp with fright and cross the street at the sight of him.