Patchwork People XXXII Welcome Home
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Patchwork People XXXI: The Wisdom Of Ghosts. free porn video
XXXI. The wisdom of ghosts.
Edgar Birdwell was an awful poet. There was just no two ways around it.
It wasn't only that his language was stilted and clunky, antiquated even
in his own day, or that his themes were self-censored, disguised in
tortured euphemisms to the point of utter obscurity. He was simply a bad
writer. There was a good reason he was self-published. Who else would?
Birdwell had an ear with more tin in it than a can.
Marcia's fantasy, ex- graduate student of literature that she was, of
rescuing Birdwell from obscurity and providing American letters with a
new literary star by writing the first critical appreciation of his work
were dashed upon her actual reading of his ungainly verses, which honked
and staggered across the page like a flock of one-winged geese. A
typically awkward simile she'd borrowed directly from the bard himself.
My god, one couldn't help but wonder, what in the world had ever put it
into the man's head to think he could write? Better he should have taken
up carpentry. Then again perhaps one gave him too little credit for sheer
perseverance. Maybe the beauty of it wasn't that the man thought he could
write, but that he was driven to do so, even in the glaring absence of
any natural or earned aptitude.
What could have driven him?
Well, that would have to remain a relative mystery as well.
His work was filled with intimations of some secret forbidden love but
he'd hidden it too well for anyone to identify with any certainty.
Certainly, Marcia couldn't. She might speculate, could make an argument
who--or what--Birdwell was talking about with such sublimated erotic
passion. It might have been a woman, inaccessible for one reason or
another, married, perhaps. But it just as well might have been a man. Or
God. Or a horse, or a fence-post, or, for that matter, a cantaloupe. A
revisionist literary theorist could write a fairly well-reasoned book
supporting any of those hypotheses, as well as a dozen others equally if
not more bizarre. "Edgar Birdwell: First Poet Lover of
Extraterrestrials."
Marcia could see it on the Hope Crossing library bookshelf now. Of
course, like Birdwell, she'd have to publish it herself.
In the end, what was inspiring about Birdwell was not what he'd written,
but how much he'd written. How dedicated he was to putting down his
observations and the meticulous way in which he did so, taking it on
faith that his effort wasn't wasted. And it wasn't wasted, was it? His
poetry, if serving no other purpose, had given value to his otherwise
reclusive and seemingly threadbare life. He wrote without any audience,
without any hope of an audience, without any encouragement, certainly; in
fact, with all the discouragement that only a thoroughly disinterested
world could provide. He wrote, apparently, because the act of writing
made him feel more alive. What better reason could there have been than
that?
As painful as it was, Marcia felt almost duty-bound to read through his
oeuvre, as if Birdwell had been writing somehow to her, "the unknown
peruser" of his soul, existing as she did in the "far-flung'ed future"
only he could imagine, and hope, his ideal reader would exist. What would
he have thought of her, his "fair lover of another time"? She would
likely not be what he expected. On the other hand, in the case of a man
as unconventional as Birdwell, maybe she wasn't giving him enough credit.
And he had given her something hadn't he? She hadn't read his work
without being affected and, in the end, wasn't that all any real writer
could hope to achieve? That his or her words would communicate over time
and space. That they would live again in another's minds and emotions? It
was a form of possession, even reincarnation, a resurrection, if only a
brief one, borrowing another human being's mind and body to vicariously
experience once more what it is to be alive.
The world wasn't ready for Edgar Birdwell. Marcia didn't think it would
ever be. But he'd been inside her for a time, sung his song once more,
and Marcia felt herself the better for it. No doubt a little bit of him
would stay on in her for a long time to come. Maybe for as long as she
lived. Well, should that be the case, he'd be a welcome, if eccentric
guest. He'd taught her a valuable lesson, as valuable as any Shakespeare
had ever taught her, and for that she'd be forever grateful.
* * *
It was one of those nights when the past came parading back in
phantasmagoric fashion, circling behind her determinedly closed eyes,
insisted as a carnival merry-go-round. There came a point at which Marcia
knew it was pointless to keep lying there, hoping for sleep to come. Not
wanting to wake him, Marcia waited until the sound of Walt's breathing
was deep and regular. Then she slipped from beneath his heavy arm and out
of bed.
She made her way down the tight hall of the trailer to the small galley
kitchen. She fixed herself a mug of tea, carefully lifting the kettle
from the portable stove before it could whistle. Then she bundled herself
into one of Walt's double-x-sized hoodies and stepped outside.
The night was chill and clear.
She settled into one of the canvas folding chairs on the small square of
patio flagstones. She pulled the sleeves of the oversized sweatshirt over
her hands and cupped the mug for warmth. She tucked her bare legs beneath
her.
Phoebe had been gone for three weeks but it already felt like a lifetime.
Had she really been in Hope Crossing? Her visit seemed almost like a
dream, especially at this hour, when the world itself seemed made of the
most insubstantial gossamer spun on the loom of a dreaming mind, a world
whose rules might be suspended at a moment's notice, where practically
anything might happen, beautiful or horrific.
Since her daughter's departure, they'd talked a couple of times on the
phone, written back and forth several more. She was good, Phoebe
reported. Claire was keeping her promise, more or less, trying to be more
flexible. Not always succeeding, but definitely, discernibly trying.
Phoebe was keeping her promise, too. She'd returned to rehab, the day-
stay program they'd all agreed upon. It allowed her to return home in the
evenings, which, in turn, enabled her to enroll at community college. She
was taking two classes, one in creative writing, the other, in culinary
art.
Marcia smiled under the canopy of stars, alone, in the chill night.
Knowing she'd had something to do with those choices.
Her tea had grown cold. Had she dozed? At some point the sky began to
lighten to a steely grey. Unseen birds were twittering high in the trees.
Behind her the screen door creaked.
"Good morning," Walt said, hoarse and hushed. "Hey. Good morning."
He scraped a chair beside her.
"Couldn't sleep?"
Marcia shrugged. "Not really."
"I'm sorry. Anything you want to discuss?"
"Just...stuff. You know."
"Phoebe?"
"Among other things."
Walt nodded, as if this were only to be expected. "I think things worked
out pretty well, all considered."
"It's true. But you know, in some ways, it's harder now than it was
before. Before she came, it was easier to imagine she belonged to another
life. Now, having been here, she's here all the time. Or rather the empty
place she's left behind is here."
"It's worth it, though. To feel pain. If that's the price of connection.
Don't you think?"
"I don't know."
"Of course you do."
And Marcia supposed he was right.
"Have you given any more thought to my proposal?"
"Of course."
"And?"
"Maybe the time just isn't right."
Walt let it rest for a while. Then he said, "Come on, throw some jeans
on. We're taking a drive."
"A drive?"
" I want to show you something."
"Now?"
"No time like the present."
* * *
It was the oddest place he'd chosen yet to propose marriage. The Hope
Crossing Cemetery was deserted at that hour. A pre-dawn, milky fog
drifted over the softly rolling grounds and swaddled the stones, which
emerged like isolated islands in a sea of eternity. Walt had parked the
pick-up near the entrance gate and they crunch along one and then another
of the gravel paths, turning this way and that, seemingly at random,
their discussion of the matter at hand as labyrinthine and without
discernible destination as their wandering among the graves.
Not for the first time, Marcia tried to sum up her feelings as best as
she could. She sighed. It was an old argument and she was tired of
hearing it herself.
"I already feel married to you Walt. I couldn't feel any more married to
you than I do right now. It's impossible that I could, a legal ceremony
or not. I don't see what could be gained."
"I want it to be legal, to affirm it in front of the world."
"The world," Marcia said, smiling sadly. "Well. That."
She snuck a glance at Walt and felt an overpowering urge to protect him,
this great big bear of a man. What could she possibly protect him from?
His own nobility, perhaps? His own goodness of heart? She would protect
him from going into battle over her. Because she knew that he would so in
a heartbeat and she couldn't bear to see him hurt. She would rather be
hurt herself than to have him think that he'd ever failed her. Because he
couldn't fail her, no matter what happened from here on out. He had
already won for her more than she could ever have dreamed from life. But
strong as he was, determined as he was, he couldn't protect her from
everything and she knew how badly that would wound him.
"So?"
"I don't know Walt...I mean, for me, it's an easy question to answer."
Which was a lie. Well, not really a lie, more like an oversimplification.
"So answer it."
"I just don't think you know what you're asking. What you're letting
yourself in for."
"What am I letting myself in for? Tell me."
Oh, Christ, did she really have to spell it out? It was too embarrassing.
Why was he making her say it? Surely he had to know all the complications
he would be courting, all the problems he would be subjecting himself to
by marrying her. The petty intolerance, the gossipy innuendo, the smug
asides, and sidelong glances. He couldn't be unaware of what his family
would think, for one thing. Yes, they might tolerate her now at the very
occasional family get-together, because they loved Walt and knew that if
they dared to exclude her they'd never see him again, but she sensed that
they considered her just another lost sparrow that this big-hearted guy
had decided to scoop up. They figured that when he came to his senses,
which, hopefully, would be soon, he'd put her safely back in some nest or
other, preferably where he found her, and find a more appropriate
partner.
But the idea that he would take her seriously enough to marry would no
doubt horrify them all.
Did he really not understand that? Did she have to spell that out to him?
No, she just couldn't do it. Not if he willfully refused to see it for
himself. It was just too painful, too much like self-flagellation, too
much like self-pity. If she started down that path, she'd never stop.
She'd lash herself to ribbons in a fury of self-loathing.
"Tell me," he repeated softly. His breath warm in her chilled ear. "I'm
waiting."
But Marcia vigorously shook her head no.
Walt unzipped his coat and removed from inside a bouquet of flowers, pink
tulips, he'd been shielding against his body. At first Marcia thought
they were for her. Instead, Walt stepped forward towards the gravesite to
which their apparent random wandering had brought them. But upon casually
reading the inscription on the stone Marcia realized with a shock that
there was nothing random about the destination at all. The name engraved
into the stone beneath the carved angel: Amanda Watson.
Marcia said nothing, too stunned, too respectful of Walt's grief, as he
stepped forward and knelt in the damp grass before the memorial, laying
the tulips on the stone, and silently prayed. Today, Marcia noted, was
the anniversary of the girl's death.
"My daughter," Walt said, when he'd finished. "She wasn't even sixteen.
She committed suicide."
"Oh god Walt. I'm so sorry."
"You never asked me what brought me to Hope Crossing. This is what
brought me back. I know what it is to lose someone. I wasn't here when
Mandy took her life. I should have been. Maybe I could have done
something, maybe not, but I should have been here all the same. I came
back. Too late, of course. I used to think it was just penance that kept
me here after everyone else had moved away, her brothers and sisters, her
mother...it's why none of them ever come back. Too many bad memories. I
was keeping vigil, I figured, the repentant father, taking the blame. But
now I'm not so sure that was really the reason. It's more a matter of
owning up, I think. Owning up to the past and moving forward without
shame. And then I met you. And it made me think that maybe it was even
more than that. Or maybe it was connected to that. Maybe I was being
rewarded somehow. Maybe Amanda had drawn me to the place to forgive me.
To the place where I might find love and redemption and a reason to live
again."
"Walt..."
"I'm waiting," Walt said, finding his voice again. "You can take your
time. I can wait here forever. Because I'm already where I belong. I'm
just waiting for you to join me."
* * * *
Author note: I plan to publish "Patchwork People" in its entirety in
weekly installments here on Fictionmania. In the meantime, the complete
novel is currently available as an Amazon Kindle ebook for $2.99.
For more of my writings, drawings, erotica, and photos please visit my
blog Bad Pussy
sissyforlife(dot)blogspot(dot)com.
Nadine
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