The Deadbeat Club Ch. 02

Joan laughed and gave me a hug. She seemed to know I was trying…corny though I might have been…I was trying to make her happy, or, at least, happier.

The hug lasted a long while in the dimming light of dusk.

"I'm sorry about Monica…" I whispered.

She nodded.

Over her shoulder, resting on one of the boxes, I saw a small picture of a sailor riding the back of a dolphin. He was being saved from his long and lonely journey.

"Soon your sailing will be over

Come and take the pleasures of the harbor"

I began humming an old song that sounded like a lullaby for the sleeping child I held in my arms.

Part X: A Parenthesis in Eternity

He was found slumped in his easy chair, one hand hanging off the arm rest, seemingly pointing to a page in the open book laying on the floor beside him: "On the Suffering of the World." The title of the chapter his finger laid upon appeared random.

The older man's shirt was stained and encrusted with regurgitation. A shot glass, half full, stood next to the book, circled by whiskey stains.

He was surrounded by piles of books, DVD's and music CD's. He could have never read, watched, or listened to them all.

Nearby, a bunch of unpaid bills and unwritten checks were spread out on a coffee table.

It had been Memorial Day, but all the media were celebrating the 40th anniversary of "The Summer of Love."

He had begun his evening drinking to his youth and its promise, including all the 'free love' that was in the air at Monterey. He had attended the Monterey Pop Festival at the age of only fifteen. It was an experience that stayed with him for life…and helped fashion his thoughts about life, thereafter.

On the screen of his laptop, the last page of his last story shone. It was about a lonely man who died in the end. He was a ghastly, thin miser. In the story, the more he hoards, the thinner he grows, until he just fades away.

It wasn't much of a story…and it had probably been done before.

But the fact that it had been done before didn't diminish it entirely. After all, the most enduring myths and legends had been told over and over, by many different cultures and civlizations for eons.

They plagiarized with a purpose. Can one really steal the story of our inner truth?

I doubt it.

And so he rationalized his little, common story as he downed another shot.

The story, as it appeared on his computer screen, mattered little. The story as it played out in people's lives—again and again—meant everything.

"The arts appear tiny, like a reflection in a muddy puddle, to the Life they reflect," his muddled, whiskey-laden mind struggled to articulate.

The card with his daughter's grand announcement lay on the bar. He would deal with it in the morning.

For now, he listened to the loud music from the speakers as they drowned out thoughts of the world. Like donning the divers helmut and suit he took another shot and shut out the lights.

"Now it's dark…" he whispered. He hoped it might remain so forever. Like a diver that cuts the air pipe that sustains him, he let go to the drink and darkness, waiting for the sea-girls to come and sing to him again…between the windows of the sea. Their songs would dissolve the serpents and monsters that were sent to plague him.

"One diver has surfaced…Dr. Serizawa has yet to begin his assent."

It wasn't the depths that he had to fear, but the surfacing.

And so he sat, thinking and communing with himself...

A lone soul giving confession in a dark room.

The End