47

Chapter 47

I stuck the key into the ignition and tipped it forward. The engine turned over as if groggy from a long nap, then de-bugged itself into a mostly consistent purr. Shifting into drive, lurching toward the asphalt, I proceeded east across town, slowing as I finally reached the general vicinity of where Bufford said he had hidden the truck. Sure enough, a grove of crab apple trees soon appeared, from which sprouted a dilapidated double wooden-posted billboard advertising a specific Johnsons & Jonhsons hair product. I bumped over the culvert, circled around and backed the Suburban up to within a few feet of the moving truck's back end, and shut off the motor. Climbing out of the driver's seat, I shielded my eyes from the morning sun. I wished I'd grabbed a breakfast burrito or something. Hard, hot work was ahead of me, work that was going to probably take a while. (That's what she said).

The loading door wasn't locked, so I grabbed the handle and used the momentum to haul myself up into the cargo area. Surveying the scene, my shoulders dropped.

Like pandemonium frozen, a Guernica scene of original oils scattered every which way. A veritable scree field of angular audacity. A big messy mess of a mess. The high-speed chase had done massive violence to my careful packing job, and the results were obvious though, thankfully, largely of only an organizational type. Bleeding was at a minimum. Most of the recognizable damage was limited to scrapes along some of the frames. Only a few canvases had sustained noticeable rips or puncture wounds.

I went about transporting and re-organizing the paintings as best I could into the Suburban and after an hour or so had established a passable new order for them. It was tight, but everything fit well enough. The temperature was already unbearable--everything in my line of vision was rippling with heat waves and I was beginning to feel light-headed--so I cut short the detail work, blessed the effort, and crawled back out of the empty moving truck and onto the ground, kicking up clouds of scalding dust as my flip flops hit the grass. Sighing deeply, I made my way back to the Suburban and dug around the passenger seat for my backpack. I pulled it over and fished out a dirty white T-shirt and a Mason jar full of gasoline. Then I walked back over to the loading fender, unscrewed and tossed the lid. I immersed the t-shirt up to the sleeve and took a lighter from my pocket. I turned the jar upside-down so as to soak the shirt, and lit the sleeve. Then I lobbed the jar against the forward wall and jumped up to grab the nylon pull strap. The weight of the door lowered me down to the ground like an angel, and I struggled to click the loading door into place. Flames were already licking beneath, melting the rubber seal and destroying any evidence of my involvement.

Returning to the Suburban, I turned the key, shifted it into gear and managed back around the sign, into the culvert and, finally, onto the shoulder. The highway was coming to life for the morning commute and I blended into it all. Looking back, I saw the Tresseme billboard already consumed by a tornado of thick black smoke and flames that were ghostly invisible against the morning sun and stark white clouds. Tom Petty played in my head as I crossed the county line.


END OF BOOK I

46

Chapter 46

Paper clipped to Ineola's screen door the next morning:


Bufford-

You've been a good friend for years. I know things are remarkably anguishing for you right now. Use caution. Test everything. Be wise in the way you act and with what you let into your skull; evil is afoot. I feel it. If Ocho Rios is where you've determined to go, you have my blessing, not that it is in the least bit required. Take care of yourself, and may we meet again soon and drink Budweiser well into the night under that large tree in lawn chairs of questionable integrity.

I should be back in eight days at the most.  When I return, I look forward to redemptive news from you, and will be in a certain and recognizable state of angst and distraction until that moment.

Godspeed in your travels and objective.

Forever your friend,

Brody

45

Chapter 45

I decided to ride out the rest of the day in the front yard under the big tree, not knowing what to do next. No one was about and I had the whole afternoon to consider my dilemma. At this point, I was sure the police would finger-print the paintings in the truck and I would be hauled in as an accomplice in one of the most annoying bank near-robberies of the city's history. Aiding and abetting, harboring a criminal, conspiracy to commit robbery...art theft? Who knew what they would throw at me in an effort to get me to talk. I steeled my resolve.

It was then that something flitted across my peripheral vision and I heard the screen door slam shut. Turning around in my lawn chair, I saw Bufford peeking through the curtains of my living room, surveying the scene, eyes wide as ping pong balls.

It took an hour or more to calm him down to the point he could re-count his experience. His story truly was incredible, but I knew a thing or two about celestial events and metaphysical anomalies, so I recovered rather quickly from the temporal aspect of his tale. After, I berated him for the "asinine stunt" and huffed about his "lack of vision and general hold on reality" for a while. Then we discussed the potentially contrasting values of immediacy and caution in a situation like his and finally determined that things were not going as he had hoped. In the end, he gave me the truck keys and described its location. He had hidden it on the east side of town beneath a Tresseme shampoo billboard partly obscured by a grove of crab apple trees. No more decisions would be made today, he said. He needed to sleep. He suffered from something like an extreme case of jet lag and complained of an infernal honking sound in his head that would not go away. I told him I hoped he understood, but that I was leaving early the next morning and we would talk on the phone the next day. We shook hands and he retired for the night across the yard to Ineola's house.

44

Chapter 44

The police chase made the news, both the 5 and 6 o'clock varieties. That was no small feat in our town. I guess it could be partly owed to the unusual nature of the chase, but it was more probably about the more unusual nature of its end. Indeed, David Copperfield (of the illusionist, not the literary phylum) could not have pulled off such a feat. Channel 9 caught the mythical event from their very expensive helicopter camera: Bufford in the big yellow truck careened down the 4 lane with at least 12 police cars in proverbial and literal hot pursuit. They all headed for the large tunnel that would take them under the reservoir and into suburbia, disappearing one by one beneath the dark maw of concrete and kudzu. Then, in a cloud of grease and swirling dirt, they all emerged on the other side. All, that is, except for one large yellow truck and its driver. Half the police force of that fair city squealed, squeaked, and slid to a stop, confused, their tires leaving numerous erratic question marks streaked into the asphalt.

What had happened was that time had stopped again. It caught Bufford and the yellow truck in its powerful sphere of influence, but missed the rest of the show. The city's finest were completely unaffected and no one saw nothin' except for, as one officer put it, "a blinding flash of light accompanied by the sound of one of those model T rubber squishy horns, farting over and over for the span of 5 or 6 seconds." (His testimony is as of yet uncorroborated). Be that as it may, Bufford exited the tunnel in what was assumed to be his current state of fight-or-flight, driving 82 miles per hour like a bat out of...a tunnel, and hit the surface in the dead of night. Now, this confused him something terrible, so he used his rear-view mirror. There were no police cars. There were no cars at all to speak of, it being now 3:37 a.m. and all. He pulled off the road onto the gravel shoulder and caught his breath and bearings. This took a while. Then, he tossed the massive head off and elbowed it across the seat, stumbled out of the truck and stumbled further, out of the fuzzy dog suit. He had a headache the size of his problem and couldn't see through all the stars and pinwheels dancing in his field of vision. In a few minutes, he'd stumbled all the way to a pay phone and dialed my number. At which point I was involved, again.

After the fiasco, I had phoned Debbie to pick me up after her kickboxing session (or organic gardening class, I don't remember which), and she was happy to do it. Not explaining why I needed a ride required some conversational diversion tactics, especially when the first thing she asked was whether or not I had seen the crazy police chase on the news, and whether I thought it was an alien abduction or a spontaneous sink hole like those in Chile and Austin, MN. I told her I thought both propositions were equally tenable and suggested we spend the rest of the trip praying for the perpetrator's clearly wayward soul. That worked. Debbie was a devout member of the Jesus, Mary and Joseph Community Church. I was praying for something else entirely: for the grace to gracefully overstep the bounds of social etiquette with Debbie. (No, not that). Debbie owns a tan 1978 Suburban.

When she pulled up at my house, I leaned forward but paused with my hand on the door.
"Deb, I've decided I need to ask you for a favor."
"Shoot, boss." (She always called me that).
"I need to borrow your car. And before you answer, you need to know it's a longer-term thing, like, 2 weeks."
"Well, I guess that would be OK. What for?"
"It's a long story, but it has much to do with therapeutic art, family ties and a sacred promise I made to a dear friend who has recently passed."
She was silent but for a moment then she opened her door, stepped out onto the street, and tossed the keys through the open window onto the cracked faux leather seat.
"Don't scratch her up, boss." She winked. "And don't stay gone forever. EcoCares likes to pretend we need you. Besides, you're kinda cute, and I miss you when you're not around." She winked, then flipped her long brown hair and walked toward the bus stop.
"I promise. You watch out for those sink holes, Deb. EcoCares likes to pretend that we need you, too." Then, "Take care...and thanks." I was impressed with my come-back.
Without turning around, she flopped a slender hand into the air behind her and strutted away, her hips still very loose from that gardening class, or so it would seem. And why had I never noticed that before?

43

Chapter 43

The big purple dog who was unmistakably my unmistakably troubled friend, waddled toward me. Bufford's voice came from behind a smiling, gaping mouth and wagging red velour tongue.

"Brody. You've got to get out of here, man." He whispered, leaning in toward me.
I scanned the room for guards. There were none.
"Funny. I was just about to say the same thing to you. And can you put that weapon down completely and immediately?"
"No. I can't. but I really think you should leave. Now. What are you doing here, anyway?"
"Bufford. You really need to see someone about this erratic impulse-control issue you've got going on. You're about to bite off way more than you can chew, and there's no tunnel in the world long enough to rescue you this time."
"I just need some cash so I can get outta town. I'm absolutely going to Ocho Rios."
"Yeah, yeah, I know, which is a whole different discussion that we need to have. Even then, there are better ways, man! Let me be perhaps the first person to tell you this: you're about to go to the federal penitentiary! This is not a small thing you've decided to do here! And you have a very, very narrow window of opportunity before your options are taken away completely. From that point on, you'll have no options at all, except maybe how many push-ups you want to do before your cell block's 13 minutes of yard time. Now, listen," I looked around. All of the bank patrons were being very compliant. Sirens were heard off in the distance, though it was no guarantee they were responding to this particular situation. Wishful thinking.

"I'm not going to tell you to surrender, but you can't go through with this."
"You should surrender."
Bufford and I both heard it, and we looked around for the source of the unsolicited advice.
"You should surrender now and take your medicine."
"I'm not on any medicine," Bufford said, his voice clearly distraught.
"Yeah, yeah, I know, which is a whole different discussion that we need to have"
"Are you mocking me," I asked, against my will.
"No. They're just words. What I'm trying to tell you is this: Some people end up spending their whole lives trying to escape. You're better than that. Now, let's go. You've got more important business elsewhere, and you should be about it. Don't worry about how you'll get to Rios; you'll get it all planned out. Trust me."
Bufford exploded. "Trust you? Who are you and I'm not prepared to lay my future in the hands of someone I don't know and, more importantly, can't see!"
"I know it's difficult, but these things will become clear with time. Right now, you don't have a choice, really. Even Brody says so. Get out of here...and do it NOW!" I could swear that I saw those big plastic eyeballs shift to the left, then the right again.

And the sirens were closer now. There was movement far back in the cubicle section of the bank. An administrator of some middle level had pushed The Button or something which, by the way, goes against all their job training. The FDIC insures all accounts up to $100,00.00. Supposedly. But there wasn't much time, and there hadn't been much from the beginning.

Bufford was suddenly frozen, a still life of synthetic fur and palpable tension contemplating its future. Suddenly, the still life leapt toward the bank door, knocking over a plastic trash can and hit the front door with such force that each one spider-webbed and sent prisms of multi-colored light spinning throughout the room. Everyone on the floor sat up and surveyed the scene, mouths open. One elderly lady exclaimed, "It's beautiful!"

I walked toward the doors just in time to see one million images of my yellow truck speeding away, a blur of purple mass and black floppy ears bouncing around behind the steering wheel.

42

Chapter 42

--SATURDAY--
The local truck rental place opened at 7:00. The transaction was absolutely straight-forward, since it was cash-based. (Oh, for simpler times when our money was real, and you could lean against a light post at midnight, smoke a cigarette, and flip a coin in your hand like Carey Grant did in The Maltese Falcon. Doing that with a debit card just isn't the same thing, especially when it's windy. Smoking is bad for you).

I found that driving a truck takes more concentration than riding in a transit bus, so I was a little bit on edge, but I finally arrived at the Colonel's house with minor incident and angled up over the curb and into the front yard. Even at 7:45 in the morning the grass resembled a brush fire both in look and feel. I would need shoes for this work. I headed toward my house for my flip flops and the last V8. Stepping onto the porch, I thought I was hearing things. Specifically, I thought I was hearing a small tinkling bell. And I was hearing things, but it wasn't the imaginary things one hears that could lead to hearing Other Bigger Imaginary Things, it was a real "hearing things". The tinkling turned out to be attached to a shiny new silver ice cream wagon with a green umbrella shivering with the motion. It had four giant rubber wheels decorated with spinning red and yellow crepe paper on every spoke, and the wagon gleamed in the sun like a space ship.

"Brody! Look, Brody! Look what was in my back yard this morning. Wha'd'ya know, huh?"

Edgar was beaming with joy. I gave him a long-distant high-five and a smile and continued inside. Ethyl strikes again. I hope this new cart is upgraded with a parking brake...and a cup holder. Why not. Looked like Edgar was back in business. It didn't seem right to solicit his help in loading the paintings, so I left him to his own work.

Slipping on my flip flops, I walked over to the Colonel's back door. More crime scene tape. I used my teeth to break the tape and my knee to pop open the screen. I felt pretty ingenious for a few seconds. All that work was wasted, however, since I couldn't twist the door knob with anything less than my hand. Truly, all man's glory fades. The kitchen floor was still wet and I passed through it in the same way one would pass through earthquake rubble, and continued past the living room. The Colonel's chair was empty and the TV had been turned off.

It took about an hour and a half to load up all the paintings into the truck. I wrapped each in newspaper then bound them in groups of 5 using sheets and blankets and towels from the Colonel's closet and 2 rolls of duct tape and slipped in pillows to stabilize the whole load. I pulled down the rolling door, swing locking it all in place with a thick metal thud. I jumped into the driver's seat, situated myself and turned the key. The gas spurted into the carborator and ignited, starting the pulse of the pistuns and moving the oil through the manyfold and into the wires of the transmistion reservoir-thingie. I know a lot about cars.

I had two stops to make on my way out of town. First, I dropped by the Stop N Shop for some road trip snacks. Akhmad was behind the counter. A keen observer, he had noticed the gargantuan truck blocking out the entire store front. I had pulled through, taking up all seven parking spots. The Fritos were lined up on a tall cardboard box next to the counter, and there was a swath of Scotch tape permanently stuck on the tile below, gathering the boot scuffs of every customer, like a memorial to recent events.

"What are you doing, my friend?" he asked.

"Believe it or not, I'm delivering some things for the Colonel. I just need a Coke and some Twizzlers for the road."

"Allah give him rest. Very good, Mr. Brody. I am having some trouble insuranc-ing my damages from your friend making the trouble. Can you help me make forms and fill out application to the secret agents?"

"You mean the insurance agent?"

"Yes, I suppose. Insurgent agent."

" No, In-SUR-... uh, OK. I'll be glad to help you out. It'll be a week at least before I'm back in town, though. I'll drop by next Sunday afternoon."

"Yes. That will be fine. And many thanks."

I paid for the snacks, exited by the front door, climbed back into the truck and released the parking brake. My final stop was the bank just on the edge of town, not because I had an account there, but because Edgar found out a while back that they give away free Dum Dum suckers at the self-service kiosk. I pulled into the parking lot and coasted to the edge of it, again taking up seven parking spots. (You wouldn't relish trying to park one of those things in a legitimate spot, either. don't judge). I left the truck running, and walked across the lot and through the large tinted double doors, blinding myself when I stepped into the sun's reflection as it swung across the glass.

Strolling up to the self-service kiosk, I began picking through the vast array of colors, finally settling on one of those wrapped in the red 'surprise flavor!' wrapper. This one would be for later. For immediate consumption, I wanted something a little more sure. I feathered the options and was reaching for grape when I heard a voice from across the room yelling, "OK! This is a stick-up! Everybody get your hands up and lie down on the ground!" I was too startled to realize immediately that specific directive didn't make much sense, and I just froze, two fingers grasping a grape sucker still halfway in the bowl.

"I said 'down' and no one will get hurt!" the voice repeated. It seemed muffled and quite agitated. I scanned the room to find the source. When I found it, I was shocked with a sense of surreal recognition. The bank robber was seven feet tall, brandishing a shot gun, and dressed from head to toe in a matted purple dog suit. The head rotated slowly in my direction. Matching my eyes, it dropped the weapon and froze.

PART IV: THE LEAVING IS THE HARDEST PART / 41

PART IV: The Leaving Is The Hardest Part


Chapter 41

Debbie was distressed that I was leaving, but promised to do all that was necessary to keep the machine grinding on. Mr. Soloman graciously decided to bequeath upon us a healthy amount of money from his corrugated cardboard business in Oslo. I paid the essential bills and said my farewells. When I left, I noticed that the office smelled like petunia blossoms.

I arrived at home, halfway expecting Bufford to be reclining on Inolea's front porch nursing a V8. He wasn't, and he wasn't. Edgar was nowhere to be found, either. I rifled through my closet and bathroom for essential "taking a short trip" items, and threw them all into a duffle, repairing its shoulder strap with some duct tape and a safety pin. For grins, I included the CosmoTech mug. Then I took off the lamp shade in the living room, reached inside and untaped an envelope which held three fifty dollar bills. I got a gallon orange juice carton and a plastic milk jug from the refrigerator, cut off the tops, and retrieved another three fifties from them each. My own version of the FDIC. I've never trusted banks. You shouldn't either.

I gathered everything onto the couch, sat down in the La-Z-Boy and tried to figure my strategy. No car. Little money. No reasonable way to transport me and over 175 sentimental paintings to Seattle, Washington. What to do.

[It was one of those times in well-written stories where a surprising plot twist conveniently allows the story, otherwise doomed, to continue. Let's not call it a 'contrivance'; life is full of legitimate surprises, orchestrated from Above].

Feeling a bit more relaxed  due to this recognition, I spied Ethyl's note on the floor across the room. It was flipped back-side up. There was writing--writing I'd missed upon first reading. I walked over to pick it up. When I read it, my faith in Providence was renewed. It said, and I quote:

"One mre think I lift you agift. Look under th porch. Them flowers sur are purty huh."

A caterpillar jumped in my stomach, broke tradition and transformed immediately into a bouncy little butterfly, then exploded into a whole herd of them. I opened the screen door and looked over the side of the porch at a suspicious plot of petunias. Looking closer, I saw hidden within the stems of the flowers a Zip-Lock baggie. In this neighborhood, the contents of such a baggie would usually be only one thing. Untrue in this case as, when I opened it and unrolled the paper towel, the contents looked a lot like $2,300.00...because it was. What a sweetheart, that Ethyl was, and what an angel. The question remaining now was, Ryder or UHaul?

40

Chapter 40

I used the phone in the kitchen to call the police. It was the only thing I assumed to be my legal responsibility in such a situation. Before I could make it across the yard back to my home, a singular police car pulled into a lazy stop at the curb between our houses. Dust escaped from beneath it like steam from a broken pipe. I decided it would happen sooner than later anyway, so I altered my course for interception and the hopefully short "he didn't do it" interrogation with the officer.

"Good morning, officer". Oops. I immediately realized I'd committed a verbal indiscretion. He didn't seem to notice, or care.

He looked somewhat like an hyena that had wandered out of its habitat, cross-pollenated with that butler from The Adams Family. He had bug-eyes, thick dark hair just on the kept side of disregarded, and one ear slightly higher than the other. His uniform was threadbare with a dark spot of coffee just under the badge, "Stemholtz", number 384. He approached in full swagger mode with a pen and note pad attached to the end of his swinging arms.

stopping ten feet away from me, cautious. Impeccable training.
He queried, "Are you the individual who contacted us about the deceased?"
"Yes."
I chose to keep it simple, reasoning it best not to over-explain. The police in this area are pre-disposed to cynicism, conclusion-jumping and impromptu tasering. Comes with the territory, I suppose. Even if they begin so, new recruits around here don't remain optimistic about human nature for long, and it just gets worse until they are either found guilty of using excessive force or they abandon their cruiser behind the Stop N Shop one day, never to be seen again. There's quite a turn-over on the local force, and several pending investigations.

  "I'll need you to remain in your home today until I ask you a few questions. You understand," officer Hemholtz grumbled.

And, yes, I did. That didn't change the fact that I had to get to work at some point. EcoCares had a big grant dog-and-pony show for Arthur W. Solamon, III at one thirty and, as benevolent founder, it was important that I be there. I hoped officer Hemholtz would find efficiency convenient. He cocked his head toward me slightly as if contemplating a vague level of recognition. Then he turned, unbuttoned his taser gun, and walked toward the Colonel's house. He did some more swaggering toward the front door, looking either quite tired or formidable, I wasn't sure which. Then he knocked, which I thought was strange. I mentioned in a friendly way that the back door was open and to mind the floor, then made my way back to my house to pour my favorite breakfast cereal mix: Raisin Bran and Frosted Mini-Wheats. I used a dirty bowl and the last of the milk in the fridge.

Haikus are easy
Though some don't make any sense.
Refrigerator.

After waiting on my couch for the better part of an hour, I got up and strolled to the window. The cruiser was gone and there was yellow plastic crime scene tape strewn all over the Colonel's front lawn. It  resembled the aftermath of a violent territorial dispute between the tribe of cordless paper shredders and the dollar store rain ponchos. The front door was taped shut with a proud banner. "Do Not Open--Crime Scene". Crime Scene. Maybe they know something I don't. Since when did a heart attack become against the law?

I walked to the corner and took the next bus into the city, preparing some notes for my secretary, Debbie, on the way. There would be minimal difficulties shuffling off my work to her and to Billy the volunteer who shows up sometimes maybe sporadically, schedule largely determined by whenever his conscience needed bleeding off.

I would budget 1 week for the trip, This should be more than enough time. Maybe I'd scoot by my sister's house on the way back. Maybe not. The sun was giving me a headache, and the smog was causing my vision to blur. Or maybe it was the other way around. Either way, I couldn't see and my head hurt. I needed underarm deodorant and some of those Water Pik glide floss strips. My dentist is fond of saying that if I'm going to either discontinue flossing or cut off your arms, flossing's going to be difficult.

39

Chapter 39

I awoke the next morning with a nagging feeling that today would be important on numerous levels. To have such information thrust upon you before even choosing your boxer shorts for the day is quite the weight, and I met it with a winner's response: promptly ignoring it. I wasn't in the mood for 'important'. I just wanted to sleep in a bit. With one crisis apparently solved and a number of others picking up speed, I needed a little reflection time. So I rolled over and reflected. I had to do something about that east-facing window, though, and the sun is a hard bargainer. By 7:15 my bedroom was so hot I couldn't sleep anyway so, peeling off the thin bed sheet, I decided it was time to go to the Colonel's and commit once and for all to his mission of interstate delivery. I hoped this would make his day.

Pulling on a white T, I chose the boxers that were on top of the 'to be washed someday' pile (default) and stepped outside. Bufford must have retrieved his work clothes earlier, or perhaps they harbored more magic than I knew. Either way, they were gone. I made my way across the yard barefoot, my vision impaired from shielding my eyes. A jagged piece of plastic from a Tic Tac container embedded itself in my heel. I knew better than to traverse my yard barefoot. With a mild shriek, I plucked it out, tossing it to the street where it would do me no more harm. I could probably get tetinus from something like that. Since they've been keeping records, an average of 381 people die from tetinus every year...23 of those from untreated paper cuts. Blood poisoning. A, AB, Be positive you're current with your shots.

I stepped up to the Colonel's porch without further incident. His back door was halfway open. I knocked on the screen three times. No answer. Since the Colonel's house was not one I would feel comfortable just barging into, I knocked again, five more aggressive raps this time. Still nothing. Figuring I had given more than fair warning, I slowly opened the screen door and called his name. Walking cautiously into the back room, I felt something cold on my feet. Ah ha--The linoleum was flooded with water. Sure enough, upon inspection, I saw the kitchen faucet running full-blast into the sink and pouring onto the floor in a Niagara Falls of wasted municipal resources.
"Colonel!" I called. "You've got some water going on here!  Colonel BB?" I tip-toed lithely across the floor.

Thinking it was possibly stuck in the open position or something, I tried to close it. It turned off easily. Strange. Torn between beginning the clean-up and locating the Colonel, I stood in the middle of the kitchen, considering. It was then I noticed the TV on in the living room. Colonel uses the television mostly for research and confirmation for his various conspiracy theories, (my favorite of which being that Uzbekistanian sanitary workers were sending paramilitary groups in Michigan secret messages involving an imminent government coup, and encoding these messages in the sermons of famous televangelists. Brilliant. Fractured, but brilliant if it was true).

In a fit of decisiveness, I decidedly decided it was more important to locate the Colonel. Perhaps he had information about the kitchen mishap...or, lacking that, the ensuing revolution. I walked into the living room. Asleep. Sound asleep, apparently. He was pushed back in his recliner rocker, footrest up and looking quite peaceful while the receding tsunami ensued in the next room. Something wasn't right with that. I approached.

"Colonel? You alright? Hey?" Nothing. It was then I recognized that this was serious. I reached over carefully and slid two fingers below his wrist to check his pulse like I'd seen it done on TV. As I'd feared, there was none. He was cold, ashen and heavy.  Not quite sure what to do (the Colonel was much more adept at handling this sort of thing), I steadied myself against the wall and weighed my options. Looking around, I noticed a note thumb-tacked on the door facing of his studio. On the note was hand-written the address and phone number of the Colonel's daughter.

I pulled the note from the tack and returned to the living room. On the coffee table, there was a pad of paper with a pencil on top and a single sentence printed on the paper: "Death rhymes with orange".

38

Chapter 38

     True to form, Edgar knocked on the door at exactly seven o'clock with his Top Three List for Ethyl. It took me a while to explain the recent and unanticipated going-ons with our circle of friends. Admittedly, it was confusing.

Things, they are a-changin'.

     In catching him up, I chose to leave out the part about a dog head blessed with the gift of speech. In fact, I doubt I'll ever discuss that with anyone. Too weird.

     Bufford emerged from the shower a few minutes later, took up the note again and re-read it. He said he needed to do some research at the library and headed out with the last V8 and a slice of white bread in a Ziplock.

     I could tell that Edgar wanted to stay for dinner, so we ordered pizza. We pulled out the lawn chairs, leaving one empty for Bufford's return, and added one from the kitchen for Edgar. We were out of beer and V8s so I left him at the house for the Stop N Shop. The sun was an angry orange descending over the rooftops. It reminded me of what a nuclear explosion might look like if those talks with North Korea went south, (pardon the pun).

     I heard the front door of Ineola's house open and close around 11:00. I didn't go over. I'd promised to support his quest and for now that probably meant giving him room to think right now. I folded up the dog suit and placed it on one of the lawn chairs on the front porch. I returned to the living room. The dog head was sitting off-center on the La-A-Boy, its right ear flopped across an eye. I considered it a while, then gingerly picked it up and walked it outside. I leaned down and rested its bulk against the porch column, then closed the front door, locking it. Walking to my bedroom, I could have sworn I heard someone say, "Goodnight, Brody".

37

Chapter 37

That evening, I limped home from an especially blasé day made up of emails to oil companies, conciliatory phone calls to creditors, and the beginning of a termination of one Josef Balderamo, an "employee" who hadn't shown up for work once after his orientation period. This short time in my employ had apparently allowed him enough time to make off with 14 pencils, an empty paper box, and a Scotch tape dispenser. He didn't return my numerous calls or respond to increasingly urgent emails from our secretary, Joan. I hate firing people, but I had a business to run and an environment to save. Josef will have to save himself.
Stepping up to the porch I let out a huge sigh--breathe out the bad, and breathe in the new--and remembered that Bufford and Edgar would be coming over tonight to share their best thinking with Ethyl. I decided to check the mail.

This is something I do infrequently. I suppose I just don't find much there of consequence, and apparently the "solicitor no-contact list" is as farcical as giant sewer alligators and is as useful as having 27 words for "ice" in LA.
That day, however, there was something unusual: a note from my sister in Oregon. I read it on the porch, a lone droplet of sweat from my forehead letting go and tapping against the salutation:


Brody-
On the hopeful assumption of your interest, things are going great for us. We're back from Puerto Vallarta last Monday. David is still dabbling in photography and immersed in being a stay-at-home inventor. It's a good thing that buy-out went through for us or we'd be miserably broke. Stephanie is closing in on 3 terrestrial years now, and Bracken is a feisty 7 months old. All are well and successfully adjusting to life in a quadratic formula.

I hope you're enjoying LA in the summer. I can only imagine. I truly hope to see you around sometime...more likely now that David and I are in-country for a while, if it is ever likely at all. The monsoons have effectively pushed us out of Camaroon for the season; no more trading to be done in the rain; they see it as bad luck. Anyway, feel free to drop by whenever for a lemonade and crumpet...or a beer, a cookie, and a push on the dangerous-but-Stephanie-just-had-to-have-one tree swing.

With love at a distance,
Cynthia

"...at a distance" versus "...from a distance"? It could mean so much. We hadn't seen one another since middle school, when she dropped out to pursue what would become a 10 year degree in finding a well-to-do  husband. I guess I was more partial to girls, one of the million things upon which we differed. Still, we were different but amiable, and I think she felt a sense of pride in keeping in contact with her poor, maladjusted brother out in California. (I didn't say it, she did. Or didn't, which is just as bad or worse). I folded the letter up again, stuffed it in my pocket, and went inside. Mom always liked her better.

There was a sound behind me. Bufford stood in the middle of my yard with a very serious look on his face. Can we just have a nice, normal day with no surprises?

"What's up, Bufford?"

The dog took off his head and dropped it on the porch with a thud. he held up a note. It was scrawled in purple Crayon, apparently from the unpolished hand of a pre-teen...or medical doctor.
"Read this".

I did:

"You no what this is about. You wil find your problem man on  the north beach of Ocho Rios at the Hotl Coyabo. He has paid through Tuesday of next wek. Do what you want. He has th money. You dont' know me."

I read it again.

"You no what this is about. You wil find your problem man on  the north beach of Ocho Rios at the Hotl Coyabo. He has paid through Tuesday of next wek. Do what you want. He has th money. You dont' know me."

Pursuing this was highly unusual, extremely suspect, and totally inadvisable. I said so.
"Bufford. This is highly unusual, extremely suspect, and totally inadvisable. Where did you find this thing?!"
"I decided to work a night shift at Iris and 10th to expand my potential customer base, and found it this morning pinned to the back of my outfit uniform. I'm still at a loss, really. Wha' do you think, man?"

"What do I think? I think selling waterbeds in a dog suit is probably a better alternative to fleeing the country on a vengeful mission sparked by some anonymous cryptic note rife with bad grammar and character spacing."

Bufford looked at me with glazed eyes, like a digital TV signal on pause. He seemed to be holding his breath. There was an urgency in his face and a lump building in his throat. I saw the value of repealing my blanket censure of the idea.
"Well, I suppose I can't really tell you what to do about this. I wasn't the one who lost a perfectly good job complete with advancement opportunities and a personal parking spot. You do what you need to do. Of course, there are things that must be completed before you leave."
"Like what?"
"Like the fact that you're a wanted man and extradition from Ocho Rios is no big deal, and you simply have to give two weeks' notice before quitting your job, to be fair. You don't want to become that which you hunt."
"Hmmm. Good point."
"Tell ya what. Let's you and I go down to the book store tomorrow. We'll do a little research."
"Research on what?"
"How to disappear completely", I said. "For now, you should get a shower and draft your letter of resignation."
And with that, he placed the dog head on the La-Z-Boy and was gone. I stood in silence for a while. Then I was drawn to the dog head. Its eyes stared at me with a look of foreboding. The tongue retracted into its mouth and I heard a low growl. What? My imagination. The pipes contracting in the bathroom shower. Then it spoke.
"Brody."
My adrenaline shot through the sheet rock like oil from a wild cat derrick. I stared at the dog head, apparently now blessed with the gift of speech.
"Brody."
"What?"
"You must support your friend's need for closure. This is important." Its eyes blinked.
"What do you mean? It's dangerous and ill-advised. He should let by-gones be by-gones, and allow the Universal System to take care of the rats in the ship."
"Buddy, I've been around a while and seen a lot. Trust me when I say this will all work out if you just let him do what he has to do. Truth is on his side. I may not look too much like an angel, but that's what I am, more or less. He will decide to pack me along on his trip, though it seems illogical. Encourage it. It's my job to take care of him when you're not around. And in case you were wondering, this is when you pass the mantle to me. Can you deal with that? Can you support your friend in this way?"
Suddenly, the eyes went darker. The energy in the room was gone, like a light had burned out or something. It was again just matted artificial hair and polyester. I came to the realization that I had been having a fairly lucid conversation, spiritual, even, with a dog costume. The Inevitable Question ran through my head, but I didn't feel crazy, just visited by something. Yes--an Important Visitation. And I couldn't shake the fact that Bufford now had a guardian angel in the most concrete way.

Oh, boy.

PART IV: NOTES FROM THE UNDERGROUND AND CERTAIN DEPARTURES / 36

PART IV: NOTES FROM THE UNDERGROUND AND CERTAIN DEPARTURES

or "memoir masquerading as metaphor, a deeply meaningful allegory of sorts"

Chapter 36

There are many ways a person can be awakened. A sort of a continuum, if you will. The most agreeable way is the gentle kiss of a beautiful woman, accompanied by, well... Next would be the sweet melody of a songbird in the front yard. Somewhere in between is the utilitarian beep of the alarm clock, full of annoying possibility. Blaring street work, nuclear blasts, and the like top the opposite side of the spectrum. That, and the repeated pounding of a tack hammer on the front door. And this is how I was awakened the Tuesday morning following the evening's 'town meeting'. The annoyance was over before it began, to use a trite cliche. So I went back to sleep, figuring nothing would change between now and whenever I decided to get out of bed and investigate. And I was right.

When I did decide to bravely embrace the day, I found a note nailed to my front door. It was scrawled on a crumpled sheet of paper tattooed with tire tracks and was in a print of desperation and resolve and poor penmanship and it said this:

Brody-
I've been doing some thinking about [unreadable] and I do that sometimes when I need to figure something out out. Thank you for trying to help me [illegible section].. I have disided to [unreadable] for to the money You may htink [illegible section] cats, dogs, and other amimals that are in need, as I understant it. [what!?] to do that. It's like I was chosen or something to make a diferinse. Not to menchon flowers, And I will. [more unreadable section]
Sorry so sloppy.
I'll see you when I get back.
Ethyl

She had nailed the note to my door...with a tack hammer, like she was an understudy of Martin Luther. She could've just knocked. After reading it, I can't really say it cleared everything up for me. In fact, I was left with more questions than answers. One thing I did get was that Ethyl was going on a journey, possibly in more ways than one. I wished her my best, folded the note and dandelion-twirled it onto the couch. Then I scuttled into the bathroom to take a shower. I had to be at EcoCares by 10:25. Hopefully, I could finish editing the Cincinnati manuscript at some point during the day and get that in the mail. Neseccary? Necessary? Nessicary? Important.

35

Chapter 35

...the old green water hose had been wrapped around me and it held me firmly to the big oak tree beginning to catch the first flames from the intergalactic comet which had blazed overhead not 5 seconds earlier. Danny the well-dressed cannibal midget jumped around the tree like a metal wind-up toy from the '30s. With a vengeance, he beat the ground with the red plastic baseball bat he'd stolen from the village elder. The sound was deafening, and I was paralyzed with fear! I turned my head to look at the alarm clock and see it is already 6:26 p.m. and...(wait. Hold it. I'm on the couch. No garden hose or comet or little midget. What was that sound?) There it was again. Oh. Knock, knock. The front door.
You'll remember that the last time this happened, I opened the door and stood face to face with a 7 foot tall purple dog selling water beds. I begin the stumbling journey to the portico, rubbing my eyes more out of psychological than optical irritation.
For some reason, the door was locked, and the same purple dog/man mutant from earlier was waiting on the other side. I opened it and let him in. My head felt like it was the size of a watermelon...a big one, and overly ripe. I put 2 and 2 together and realized I'd slept all day but also recognized my luck at not having died from an aneurism or something.
Bufford squeezed past me, the dog head knocking me into the door facing. He continued down the hallway. I mentioned that we had to get to the store to get the Chinese food and V8s for the evening's meeting. He gave me leave to go ahead without him, saying he needed a shower before dinner. With this sentiment I was in complete agreement. I grabbed my wallet and pulled back the curtain before stepping outside. I was looking for children wielding lead pipes. It's called "residual traumatic expectation response" (RTER) and it's real. I might mention that my smiley face shirt was completely ruined.
By the time I'd returned, Bufford had indeed showered and changed, and both Edgar and Ethyl had arrived. They were all sitting in the living room. I sat the paper bags of Chinese food and the 6 pack of V8s on the coffee table and went to get a beer for myself. Everyone began eating in silence. I returned and took a seat next to Bufford on the couch.
"Thank you, everyone, for coming. Ethyl needs our help. I'll turn the floor over to her, now."
She seemed confused from my last statement and fidgeted some in the chair. At length, she placed her hand in her pocket. She then pulled out the lottery ticket and held it toward the group, somewhat like a child would who had found a piece of live ammunition in the back yard. I suppose that meant she was comfortable enough to engage in discussion about it all. I reached up above the couch and pulled the curtain across the window in an attempt to stave off the sun's assault and continued.
"Ethyl has recently come across a winning lottery ticket and the sum is nothing to sneeze over. She has no idea what to do with it and needs some support and some ideas from us. Who has something to say on the matter?
"Have you seen my blue CosmoTech mug?" Bufford asked.
"Yes. Let's deal with that later, though."
"OK".
"Anything else, more to the specific point?
"This is very exciting, Ethyl. What are you going to do with it?"
"That's the problem, Bufford. She needs suggestions."
"Oh. Right. Most people who win the lottery divvy it all out to their friends and any relatives they like. Just saying."
"OK. We're not taking any of it. No one here is going to offer that as a suggestion again. That's too much pressure on her, and there are hundreds of better things to do with it, anyway. Most every humanitarian effort you could think of is experiencing dramatic economic shortfalls, and children in shoes need China."
"What?"
"Nothing. It's not important."
"There's an orphanage in the city," Edgar spoke up, crunching into an egg roll.
"Ah, now that's a better track. Ethyl, do you have any personal affinities? Causes about which you are passionate? We could start there."
"I would like to speak to my lawyer."
"What? That's, you don't have a lawyer...do you? Anyway, I realize this is difficult for you, but you have to trust us, and we'll all work together to make the right decision."
Ethyl seemed distraught. She was clutching a throw pillow to her chest with both hands. I saw the current discussion structure breaking down.
"Here, let's do this: tonight, I want everyone to write down on a piece of paper the top 3 ways you think Ethyl could use the money. We'll get back together tomorrow and give the sheets to her. She will consider them, then make her decision. Does that sound OK, Ethyl?"
Ethyl nodded, stood up and, with the pillow still firmly clasped to her chest, shuffled out the front door. I liked that pillow. Bufford, Edgar and I finished up the rest of the Chinese food in silence and they took their leave by 7:15. I was left alone. My head still throbbed and I was pretty sure the unfamiliar sound I heard was the sink in the kitchen developing a leak. How far away was Seattle, anyway?


end of book III

34

Chapter 34

By the time we'd arrived at my house, my head was throbbing, images were a bit fuzzy, and I was hearing some temporal ringing, which I considered 'not good'. Since I most probably had a moderate to severe concussion, Edgar suggested I stay awake for at least 12 hours. That wouldn't be a problem since it was only 10:45 a.m. I left the two in the living room to go wash out my wound and get some ice to wrap in a towel. The ice cream products were still in the freezer beside the ice trays, but I thought better of offering them to the present company. I returned, applied the compress and lay down on the couch, reviewing my RICE protocol. Ethyl crawled across the floor to get a close look at the now-coagulated wound.
"This isn't exactly what I had planned for today," I said.
"Uncalled for," replied Edgar. "That looks like it might need stitches or something."
"Yeah, and to the untrained eye, I might look like a guy who had health insurance. Anyway, I'm fine and I think we need to turn our attention to the young lady among us instead."
Ethyl had returned to the La-Z-Boy. Edgar and I sat a while in expectant silence, but she didn't initiate discussion, so I decided to prime the pump.
"Ethyl, we're all one big family here. Do you mind if I share your predicament? We should bring Bufford into the discussion, as well. He gets off work at 6:00 today. Can we re-convene here at 6:30 and discuss this? I believe you'll feel better if you do."
Both parties agreed. We would have Chinese food and V8s. They both said goodbye and I put a throw pillow over my face, deciding a nap was a reasonable risk, or maybe I was still contemplating when I drifted off to a deep, red sleep. Dinosaurs stalking ina dark cave amongsubterranean trees. The heavyheartbeat thudof some steam-spewingmachine. Flowers wilting in the pathofa steam burst. Suffocating, restless sleep amongthecannibaltribes...

33

Chapter 33

I came to with a really big eyeball inches away from my face. My first thought was that I'd been abducted by aliens. Then I realized it was just Edgar leaning over me and checking for signs of life. The giant eyeball retreated back to its normal size and I tried to get up, seeing that I was lying on my back in the alley. Confused, I asked the status of reality and how I'd come to be lying on my back with the need for a Giant Eyeball Inspection.
"Are you alright?" Edgar the Eyeball asked. (People are required to say things like this in situations like that).
"One must be careful with the sharp spear of irony," I replied. Then added "What happened?" which is another thing people in my immediate situation are required to say.
"These boys jumped you and hit you over the head with a lead pipe. Came out of the blue, so to speak," Ethyl said.
"Oh. That must have been that feeling I felt."
"Probably," Edgar replied. "Ethyl was planting some of her dandelions in that crack over there when she heard the commotion of it all. Apparently, during the scuffle--which consisted of you being hit over the head then falling down, so it was over really fast--a taser and some tear gas fell out of your pocket. Ethyl was able to reach them before the hoodlums did and she scared them away by pointing the tear gas can at them. I don't think they were professionals."
"Good observation, Edgar. Ethyl, I owe you many thanks."
"Oh, Brody, you know that old saying about wilted lettuce and brothers. I was just doing my job as a friend. We should get that nasty cut healed up, though. Look at that. There's blood all over your little smiley face T-shirt. It's a shame."
We deposited the taser and tear gas canister in the dumpster, retiring them from service in a way, and began to walk home.
"I need toothpaste," I said, to one one in particular.

    -Extra Strength Tylenol
    -deodorant
    -paper towels
    -V8 juice
    -coffee
    -toothpaste
    -Miracle Whip
    -dishwashing detergent

    -Rand McNally United States road atlas

32

Chapter 32

I stepped outside the Colonel's house and walked over to Tikki's final resting spot, kicking a few fallen leaves away from the small mound of dirt. Poor fella, I thought. My immediate plan was to head over to the Burger Barn and see if I could locate Ethyl in the alley. That failing, I would check in about her whereabouts with Ahmad and a few other of the normal stoolies. All in all, I just wanted to walk, I think. I had all day; no looming deadlines at either of my works. I would just take it easy, dodge the sun by choosing a path that would take me from one shaded awning to another. Ours was a small enough world. Sooner or later I would happen upon Ethyl and, as a bonus, maybe Edgar, who I also hadn't seen in a while.
I crossed Belvadere Street and veered right into the alley behind the Burger Barn, casually strolling through a veritable Dead Sea of cardboard, newspaper pages and spoiled lettuce toward the dumpsters. It's not that I hadn't offered Ethyl food on numerous occasions, complete with a standing offer to raid my fridge, it's just that she is hesitant of being a burden to anyone, which is one reason she lives on the street in the first place, I assume. She'd never mentioned family even once and I had to wonder what the story was with that. Ultimately, this was not my problem but, in another light, it was exactly my problem...and yours. As the famous Ukrainian feminist postmodern poet said,

    All things told and,
    We are all beholden
    To one another.
    Your wilted lettuce,
    My wilted lettuce.
    Your sister is
    My brother.

But I think he was kidding, being a Ukrainian guy and all. However, I find there is often wisdom to be found in the converse of many statements such as that one, and one must be careful with the sharp spear of sarcasm and the dutiful pruning shears of irony so as not to isolate one's audience to the point of...

It was during my contemplation of this, and just after I'd unwrapped and popped one of those mini Tootsie Roll Bites into my mouth, that I felt this feeling on the back of my head that felt a lot like something feeling uncomfortable and, to be more to the point, really bad. "Wow! Kids these days can move so quickly!" That was the last thing I remember thinking before I stopped thinking anything at all for, oh, about 20 minutes according to Ethyl and Edgar.

31

Chapter 31

I followed the Colonel. At the end of the hall, he turned left and entered a bedroom. He flipped on the light. What I saw absolutely amazed me. The small room was filled with beautiful oil paint canvases. Paintings of trees, rivers, mountains, old Victorian homes, paintings of night skies, still lifes, a collie dog, helicopters and battle fields, one painting of a beautiful woman sitting on a windswept beach. They were everywhere-leaning against the wall, hanging from wires, covering the single window, canvas against canvas overlapping canvas, floor to ceiling. There were paintings positioned on numerous easels about the room and even stacked on the floor twenty and thirty deep. Paint bottles of all sizes were scattered everywhere, precariously stacked on one another on boxes and the floor. Paint brushes and cans of turpentine lay on a small desk sitting against the far wall. The room smelled like the rich, dark scent of creation.
"Wow, Colonel. You...did you do these?"
"This is how you don't go crazy, Brody, when no one thinks you've got a prayer. Yeah. They're mine. Feel free. Look around."
I did. I carefully moved among the works of art, timidly at first, since I didn't know my boundaries as a visitor, then with a growing release, flipping through the stacks on the floor, taking in each one with hungry, admiring eyes.
"These are remarkable. I had no idea you painted."
"A little bit of a surprise, eh?  Look-e there," he pointed to one of the larger canvases hanging on the wall, still drying. "Recognize that fella?" It was clearly the likeness of Tikki. He continued, pointing out each painting and recounting the stories behind them, the muse in the colors and shapes, the stories, all of them poignant and often heartbreaking. "This little room is a lot like my diary, a memory book, you know. I never was good at talkin' about myself to others, but I talk a lot to these. We have history together. They always listen, never judge me and," he looked at me and snickered, "I don't even have to wear my pants when I come in here. It's my world. I can't even hear the freeway unless I try real hard."
I picked up a painting of a winter city scape, probably Chicago, and admired the thick brush strokes he had used to create the depth and almost palpable feeling of wind and drizzle.
"So, here's the deal. This here's what I need help with. I need you to deliver these to someone. I'd do it myself, but I ain't got no driver's license or a car, for that matter, and, even if I did, sittin' that long with my leg the way it is, well, it just wouldn't work. I understand if you say no. I sure would. But if you say yes, they need to go to a little town right outside Seattle. A woman--it's hard to call her that--a woman lives there. I want her to have these. We haven't spoken for twenty years. She's my daughter. I got nothin' to pay you; I just hope you'll do it out of the goodness of your heart. I know you got a good heart, Brody. You don't have to tell me today. These have been sittin' in this room for a long time. One more day or two shouldn't matter. Now, I'm sure you've got things to do today, so I'm going to let you out. Think it over. Let me know what you decide."
With that, he turned around, flipped off the light, and hobbled back down the hall to the living room, where he collapsed in a rocking chair. His eyes followed me to the back door. I hesitated before stepping outside.
"Don't forget your orange juice," he mumbled. Then he closed his eyes and kicked the footrest up.

30

Chapter 30

The next morning, I woke up and had some Corn Flakes and OJ. My coffee pot had recently gone the way of the Do Do, its final words being a flagrant combination of spewing and coughing that emanated from the heating coil. As an alternative, I had taken to drinking V8, but Bufford had downed the last can a few nights ago after he vowed to stop drinking alcohol for some reason. Traumatic times affect us in strange ways and I shrugged his decision off, assuming it was merely a coping mechanism of sorts, a way he could feel a semblance of management of His World in the wake of being fired, hunted by the police, living in a borrowed house, and having to wear a big purple dog suit to work. Either way, I was out of V8 and planned to acquire more at the Stop N Shop during my reconnaissance tour that day. Going to my closet, I announced to no one in particular that today would be a "smiley face T-shirt, khaki shorts and tennis shoes" day. Then I got dressed and brushed my teeth. I would need to add tooth paste to the shopping list...and deodorant. Approaching the front door, the police taser and tear gas canister flashed in my periphery. The pockets of my shorts were overly large. Why not. (I was given to impetuities, anyway). And I was taking my OJ along, too, which I'd poured into a large insulated mug emblazoned with the CosmoTech logo, apparently left behind at some point by Bufford. The corporate world is always imprinting itself upon our lives without our explicit permission. From clicky pens to insulated mugs, we are often unwary billboards, much like the Goodyear blimp as it hovers and purrs innocently above sports events. It's not the blimp's fault. It is an unwilling participant in all this, too, shrink wrapped with tasty tid-bits of purchasing suggestions. The blimp just wants to see the Rams and Vikings play, that's all. The next thing you know, it's encouraging 13,529 sports fans and another million watching on TV to try Desenex. As things went that morning, I was passively endorsing a defunct computer business partaking in dubious practices. One chooses their hills to die on, though, and I was thirsty and every other mug was dirty. Corporate America 1, little people 0. I'm making too much of this, but the OJ tasted like plastic.

I stepped outside and peered up in the sky, adjusting to the harsh morning sun and the already sweltering heat. The first stop of the morning would be the Colonel's work shed. Walking across the yard, I reached the recently repaired side of the shed and continued around to the front. No sign of movement. I called a few times, but there was no reply. This was unusual, since it was way past 7:30. I headed to the back door of the house instead and knocked lightly. After a few seconds, there was the unmistakeable sound of Colonel BB's advancement across the linoleum. The door opened. The Colonel stooped a bit, scanning the horizon behind me, and pulled me in by the Smiley face T-shirt. I followed him into the kitchen.
"Sit down, boy. You had breakfast yet?"
"Yeah. Got a bowl of cereal and some orange juice. I'm good. Did you know nothing rhymes with the word 'orange'? Communist plot, perhaps? But I've got my best men on that one."
The Colonel just looked at me, clearly not intending to respond. Small talk is lost on some people.
"What are you doing here, Brody?" A cut to the chase.
"Well, we're neighbors, you've recently been through a life-altering event or two, and I just haven't seen you for a while. I guess I'm checking in to see how you're doing."
"Right kind of you."
A long silence. Then, just when I thought that maybe he thought it was my turn to talk again, he continued.
"I don't know what I did to the Whole Wide World, Brody. Maybe I pissed on it one night in the dark without knowing or sumpthin' and it's lookin' for some revenge. But it ain't that easy anymore."
"What's not easy?"
"There's just too much goin' on. Everything's movin' faster 'n I like it, to be downright honest. Bills, taxes, Uncle Sam still askin' questions, avoidin' givin' any answers, suits always comin' around, that damned ole freeway cuttin' in on my breathin'. I can't breathe good anymore, Brody. Seems there's just a big hole where things that mattered used to be, you know?"
I hadn't really planned on the Colonel opening up so much and with such a degree of honesty, so I was a bit taken aback. In the last 30 seconds, he'd said more to me than in the last 8 years I'd known him. I let the moment steep a while, mostly because I didn't know how to respond, and sipped a little on my OJ.
"I know, man. 'That which doesn't kill you...', right?" (I always go to Neitzche in times like this).
"Hmmph." I thought I heard a thin smile in his voice, faintly bubbling through to the top of his sadness. More silence, but a bit more comfortable than the earlier stretch. I pushed back my chair and made to leave.
With marked alarm, he said, "Don't know why you gotta rush off and all. If you're not in too big of a hurry to get outta my smelly ole house, I could use your help with somethin'."
I paused and looked the Colonel in the eyes. What else could I say but "OK. What can I do for you?"
"C'mon. Bring yer juice," and he led the way down the hall.

29

Chapter 29

If you are given to the habit or compulsion of playing the lottery, always review the ticket at least twice. They are designed to be at once very simple yet deceiving. In this way, they are much like first dates. Failing to do that was clearly the mistake made by person A, who had discarded the ticket I now held in my hand. Bufford, recently briefed on the new situation, had disrobed and was sitting in some yellow striped boxers and a sweat-drenched white T-shirt across from Ethyl, who hadn't spoken for some time. As had become customary, Bufford retired to take a shower in my bathroom since there was no water service in Ineola's house (which is how we still referred to it). I went into the kitchen for a bologna sandwich and some milk. When I returned, Ethyl and her mystery ticket were nowhere to be found.

What an interesting week this has turned out to be. Much hub-bub. Following the unfortunate passing of Tikki last week, there had been no signs of life from the Colonel's shed, Ethyl still had a million dollar lottery ticket, and Edgar had been MIA since his release from the Stop 'N' Shop fiasco. I determined to search them all out and see how they were getting along with everything.

28

Chapter 28

I took the bus in to work the next day. When I returned, Ethyl was pacing up and down the sidewalk in front of my house. She seemed to be in some quandary meriting a deep contemplation. I was not in the mood to engage her in conversation, but I followed her movement from the safe distance of my front porch while perusing the mail through the hazy filter of the sun and maybe a few too many egg salad sandwiches. After twenty or so passes, she stopped directly in front of my cracked sidewalk, made an almost military 90 degree kick-step and shuffled toward my porch.
"Brody. I need some advice," she said, her eyes slits of urgency and concern. "And I'm sorry about your cat."
"Water under the bridge. What do you need advice about, Ethyl?"
She moved in close and pulled something from her dress pocket. It was a ticket of some sort.
"I found this in a dumpster outside the mortuary last night. I think it's real."
Upon closer inspection, I was shocked to realize that my sweet little friend held a lottery ticket. It had been played and decidedly crumpled, the buyer obviously disappointed with the outcome. California lottery tickets pay off only 21.3% of the time, most of the pay-offs being $2.00 or less. This is a bit lower than the national average, at 22.7%, and is the perfect percentage to keep the duped masses interested while still turning a huge profit for the California Lottery Commission. But wait. Hold on a second. As I examined it more carefully, Ethyl's finger shot between me and the ticket, directing me to one set of boxes. "7, 7, 7" they read, in order, in a row, incredible.
"Ethyl, you have a..." I double-checked myself before continuing. "...you have a winning ticket here. And I mean 'WINNING ticket' in a very big way."
She pulled in closer.
"That's what I thought."
Again, we re-read the game instructions, which are not that complicated, just to be really sure this is the situation we were truly facing. It was. Ethyl turned around and sat down on my porch, hands on her knees, gazing out toward the city skyline.
"This calls for some sort of action on your part, Ethyl. You know this."
"Lord have mercy," was her only reply. I let her think it through. This would change everything.
A giant purple dog ambled down the street toward us, mildly stumbling from a case of heat exhaustion. Though you couldn't tell it by the blazing sun, it must have been about 7:45 already.

27

Chapter 27

The day after the Incident, Bufford abandoned the room he was renting downtown. I helped him sneak his meager furnishings and a bag of potato chips out under cover of moonlight. We narrowly escaped the wrath of his landlord's Rottweiler, Fussy, and didn't at all escape a nasty puncture wound in the foot from a rusty nail. We had been airing out Ineola Sanchez's house for a couple of days and preparing it for his covert habitation. Apparently, and lucky for Bufford, the Sanchez family didn't look too carefully at their annual city property tax statement, because no one ever came by to inspect or repossess the house, which meant that the taxes must have been paid up-to-date. I would be surprised if anyone would bother with evaluating just another house like that in our neighborhood, anyway. Apparently, there are bigger fish to fry down at city hall.

He was completely moved in on Friday and we celebrated this stage of his Master Plan by sitting outside on the lawn chairs with a shared reading from the Cincinnati manuscript that, amidst all the existential hub-bub, I was still laboring through. I was on page 334 of 500 pages. It still reminded us vaguely of Hemingway.

26

Chapter 26

It has been found through careful and extensive research that the path of asteroid orbits can be significantly altered simply by space-painting the object in question white. This "Yarkovsky Effect" causes thrust due to imbalances between solar energy reaching the object and heat being radiated out. Now this may not seem to have anything at all to do with Bufford's immediate situation but it does, and Bufford was only too happy to explain the connection to me. After his animated lesson, it actually made some degree of sense, though not completely: the asteroid is still an asteroid, but it looks more like a snowball from the outside and this perceived 'snowball-ness' is enough to throw off the energy reaching the object, the energy being, in this case, the intense manhunt currently underway for Bufford in his specific universe. In that universe, there was no 'clearing himself' like in the plot of some Harrison Ford/Tommy Lee Jones movie: ("I didn't kill my wife!" "I don't care.") He was guilty. He had kidnapped a woman, obstructed the operation of a business, destroyed public property, and probably committed a couple of more ticketable offenses. So, he figured he just needed to hide out a while and the whole thing would go away after an appropriate amount of time, when a tax levy or a levy break became more interesting to the media and the police. Do arrest warrants expire?

Bufford wiped his brow with the back of his shaggy arm and squeezed between me and the door to sit his huge purpleness down on my Lay-Z-Boy. He placed his head on the coffee table and leaned forward, as if preparing to divulge a nuclear secret.
"So that's what I'm going to do. The manager told me I've got this job as long as I want it. I have a sign I hang around my neck that says
The Bed Frame
 Water Beds
    Sale of the Century!
      Best Prices Ever!

and I've already staked out the best corners, Iliad and 3rd in the morning and Wysteria and 5th in the afternoon. It's all about traffic flow and the reverse commute. I'll walk the shopping mall for the rest of the day, looking at girls, sucking on a large sugary soda and eating french fries. I figure I do this for a few weeks then test the waters, you know? I'll move into that empty house next door to you and, as far as anyone knows, disappear without a trace. It's sort of exciting, really."
"Didn't Wally's ask you for proof of identification when you applied for the job?"
"Of course. I came clean and told him I was an undocumented worker from Auzer Bazan. He seemed OK with that."
"But you were born in Illinois."
"I've got a tribal robe on its way from EBay as we speak. I'll walk it out for him. There'll be no problem. He was especially impressed when I showed him the ceremonial jumping rite of my ancestors."
"Ah ha. What about a permanent address? Where is Wally sending your checks?"
"I'm picking up my checks personally, for simplicity's sake, but I gave them '2975 Artubus Dr.'"
"Oh. In reality, that's the address of..?"
"The humane society."
"Ironic and an interesting choice. It's clear you've thought this through to some point."
"Clever, huh?"
He was gloating and severely attached to this elaborate ruse. I didn't query further, as I felt it important for him that he retain the level of self-satisfaction with his plan. I sat down across the room on the couch, forming my opinion. Has there ever been such a thing as a 'perfect crime'? And did that crime involve a Snickers bar, a roll of Scotch tape, and a woman in high heels?
"Well, I guess that sounds like as good an idea as any. How much do you get paid an hour for something like this? You realize this is going to place you firmly in a higher tax bracket."
"These are desperate times, Brody. I've got to do what I've got to do."
He said this seriously, but it was hard to take him seriously in that purple dog suit.
We sat quietly for a while, letting the burgeoning morning traffic from the freeway create the soundtrack of our immediate lives. It was a type of existential crescendo building to a forte. For some reason this felt more like a rapidly approaching train in a tunnel than a true solution, but no one had produced a better idea as of yet. There was a slight rustling outside. Ethyl was planting flowers below my rolling trash cans. Waste disposal came on Wednesdays. Was that already tomorrow?

PART III: QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS / 25

Chapter 25

Since I didn't work at EcoCares the next day, I decided to spend the morning finishing up the newest manuscript I'd been editing, the one about the guy who lived in the sewer in Cincinnati, and said it was as good as _The Snows of Kilimanjaro_, which Bufford and I had both enjoyed reading last summer, but not as sweeping or meaningful, although the author did imply that the entire memoir was "memoir masquerading as metaphor, a deeply meaningful allegory of sorts", but this is what all insecure writers say about their work.

Alas, I didn't even get the laptop booted up before there was a knock on my door. Too early for bill collectors. Too early for mail. Too early for most everything, but I got up, a bit annoyed, listing like an overfilled oil tanker and lumbered toward the door. I looked through the cracked peephole. I backed out, considered, then leaned forward again with my other eye. I saw the same thing. There was, indeed, a large shaggy purple dog on my porch standing uncharacteristically erect on its hind legs. The brain is faster than the most super super-computer (for now) but no logarithm could be found to make this surreal scenario 'situation normal' inside my head. There was a large purple shaggy dog at my front door at an ungodly hour of the morning and it had just knocked at said door, and it had a tongue the size of a necktie protruding and wagging dreamily from its mouth. This is the part when one wonders if they are truly awake or still dreaming. This is also how people get shot, or stop sniffing glue.

I backed away a couple of steps from the door,  recalling the police smoke bomb and taser still in my possession. They were lying on the recliner across the room. Though I was not generally a violent man, I considered them as options. Another knock. Finally, I decided that this had been a strange week and why not keep to form. So I reached out,  twisted the door handle decidedly and pulled it open a crack. The door exploded open the rest of the way and I stood face to face with the surreal beast. It opened its mouth.

The fuzzy canine giant suddenly popped his head off with the deep, hollow sound of a WWII submarine hatch opening and held its decapitated cranium, still smiling, proudly above his body. Alarmingly, another smaller head took its place. The head belonged to one Bufford Johnson, sweating profusely and still beaming about his recent epiphany.

"Brody!" The exclamation shocked me so much that I jumped. "It came to me early this morning as I walked past The Bed Frame on MLK! If I need to hide, I don't actually have to disappear. I can be someone else right where I am now."

Where had he gotten that dog suit? Was I already aiding and abetting? What was that horrible smell?

24

Chapter 24

That next morning, I skipped out on EcoCares, the decision reached based on a note I found slipped into my screen door as I departed. In the note, the Colonel ordered us all over to his back yard, where he had fashioned a small shrine in the memory of Tikki. He had laid smooth stones in a line from the back door to its location under a Catscrath bush in the corner of the yard and erected one of those small cast concrete angels, propping it up with three slender hackberry sticks. He planted some sort of Asian weed in a circle around the angel, which was missing an arm and a section of its face. A collar was draped over the angel's outstretched arm and the whole thing sprinkled with dog food. It seemed to give off a faint orange glow and had a decidedly powerful yet absurd feel like it was channeling Gabriel Marquez.
The Colonel understood death and was familiar with grief, having experienced a lot of it in Vietnam. After completing a series of chants and pouring a liter of cheap whiskey over the head of the angel, he dismissed us into the sweltering heat of the August morning then went immediately to work repairing his shed and scanning it for LAPD bugs and other spy devices, the presence of which he was certain existed.
The rest of the day passed without anything remarkable occurring. Everyone seemed to disappear. Even Bufford failed to show up for our nightly sitting time. This concerned me a little, but I assumed he just needed some time to put all the pieces of the last few days in their rightful places, if that was possible. I followed through with the ritual anyway until dusk, kicking little pebbles at a cholla a few feet away and littering my front lawn with enough Budweiser cans for the both of us. Then I caught Letterman's monologue on TV and went to bed. There were Indian troops advancing on Pakistan and someone had successfully traversed the North Atlantic naked in a hot air balloon sporting a sign that said:

"Peace begins with you."

end of book II

23

Chapter 23

That evening, Bufford, Edgar, the Colonel and I all gathered around my kitchen table to discuss the immediate future and the implications of Bufford's actions. Over Budweisers and a bowl of Chili Lime potato chips, we reasoned together, looking somewhat like a loose postmodern parody of DiVinci's "The Last Supper". Ahmad had simmered down enough for Bufford to placate him by paying for the Snickers bar and promising to clean up the store and pay back the damage to his daily income. (You'll recall that Bufford is unemployed). Ahmad promised not to press charges, much to the satisfaction of the police chief, who had his hands full with a number of other miscreants, misdemeanors, and graffiti artists. An existential equilibrium was slowly returning to our little corner of the world, reversing the Einsteinian proposition of entropy and chaos...as far as we knew. But we don't usually see the Big Picture and, oftentimes, what looks like a relaxation of tension is actually just the momentary deep drawing of the breath of fate, readying itself to blow yet another big one.
"OK. I'll admit that I've ruined everyone's week," Bufford breathed, his hands on his forehead. "I feel much better now and I'm sorry. I should turn myself in, I suppose."
I wasn't sure he was serious, nor was I sure that was the best course of action for him.
"Well, Hold on, man. This is a little complicated. If you give yourself up, you'll definitely go to jail. Considering that, don't you think this deserves a little more thought before leaping upon the mercy of the LA County criminal court?"
To spare you the details, let me just say that there was much more discussion. So much so that we polished off the bag of potato chips and a 12-pack-plus-some. However,even after we'd achieved the sort of mental acuity such a binge provides, we were still at a loss for The Perfect Cure. Bufford slept over that night, too depressed and hazy to walk himself the 43 or so steps home. He slept on the couch with a flower-printed sheet pulled over his head. Sometimes, I told him as I clicked off the light, you can't push these Grand Ideas; they must design themselves, take form outside of our will. He mumbled something about expired canned goods. I took it as a good sign.

22

Chapter 22

3:54 p.m.

A voice broke the silence and stopped them cold! "You no more move no more, you! No! Standing right there, too! You better!!" Ahmad stood squarely in the doorway of his store, looking quite serious and protective. So protective that he was holding the classic weapon of the convenience store worker variety--a sawed-off double-barreled shot gun. Now, I'd know Ahmad for years now, ever since I moved here from Chatham, Massachusetts in '81, but I don't care if it was my Godly-sweet mother behind the business end of that firearm, I was not feeling comfortable and friendly. But, at the same time, I was getting tired of talking people down from whatever narrow ledge they were teetering today.  This annoyance barely overwhelmed my better judgment and, in a flash of ill-advisement and largely to my own surprise, I lurched forward and grabbed for the barrel of the gun, ripping it from the shocked little Indian convenience store manager.
"Oh, for crying out loud to the man in the moon, Amhad! What are you doin'?!"
"It is for you my store is lost most of money for today!  I'm tired of it! Tired! Give back my firing pistol!" He clenched his fists and jumped up and down like a small child might do when deprived of her potato peeler or tube of super glue.
"No! No more violence! No more running around, no more tying people up and no more tunnels, police, or loud noises!  We're bringing this to a conclusion right NOW!" I cried. At which point, in another flash of livid and ill-advised action, I flung the gun decidedly to the ground. This was the immediate cause of the explosion that resulted in the immediate release of the high velocity pellets found in any garden-variety shotgun shell.
A scream. A thump. Silence. No one moved. The acrid smell of freshly-discharged gun powder wafted through the air. I looked around. To my surprise, Mrs. Desdemona Franklin was lying face down on the ground, having pulled over a display of Raisinettes onto her head.
"You've GOT to be kidding!" This was too much. I bent down to ascertain the damage. "Hey, lady. Lady!"  No response. Nothing. I checked her pulse. Ahh, something. It was fairly strong. Racing, actually. I ventured to shake her vigorously. A moan and a whimper. She came to and rolled over, revealing a minor gunshot wound to the right shoulder. She had passed out, but not expired. This was a turn for the better. Or not.
"What are you doing, you scant of a man!?  Don't touch me!  Get away!!" She rose, a raging phoenix, and ran for the door. I was caught completely off-guard.
"Nope, nope, come back here!" I dove for her and caught the left heel of her shoe, sending her sprawling to the tiled floor and squealing to a stop. I slid through a smear of red as a desperate crawling race ensued and, ultimately, the wide-eyed strumpet beat me by an inch through the front door, which gave me quite a knock on the forehead as I fell to the concrete. I lay half in, half out the door, temporarily stunned by the bellows of the afternoon sun. Desdemona Franklin was high-tailing it across the parking lot, soon to be long-gone.
Through the sweltering heat waves, I scanned the lot for any residual signs of official police business. There was none. I breathed a sigh of relief and collapsed, my body bisected by the plate glass front door of the Stop 'N' Shop. The glob of oil-smeared pink chewing gum stuck to the concrete right under my nose was almost liquefied in the afternoon heat.