dmseay

I’m watching you sleep. You lie there in bed dreaming. Or, maybe your mind is blank. You breathe lightly. No noises. It is silent. I want to watch you more, but, it feels as though I’m intruding. Doing something I should not do. Watching my wife sleep in a king size bed. You seem at peace.

We used to sleep together. I say sleep. I slept while you tossed and turned, shoving me and pushing me in the back. You would say I was too loud. My snoring kept you up all night. My breathing, stopping momentarily when I was on my back. That scared you. You would wake me and tell me I was doing it again. Sleeping with my mouth open and no air coming in, or, out. Just lying there still like a corpse. A big fat dead body. Next to you, but far away. You’d tell me to go to the other room and sleep. You’re really loud tonight, you would say in a frustrated voice. Go to the other room and sleep on your side, you told me. Don’t sleep on your back. That’s a death sentence. Go on. Go, you said. I have to get some sleep. Just go.

But, I didn’t go to bed. I stood there in the doorway watching you sleep; dream. All night long till the sun came up. Just before the alarm going off. I don’t want to get caught. I don’t want to be seen looking at my wife. Too many questions and I would have to lie. Telling you I just woke up. Saying I slept fine in the spare bedroom. That’s what I would have said had I been caught. All these lies.

Downstairs in the kitchen I fumble through the cabinets looking for coffee filters. Every morning I make coffee, but, today everything seems off. The filters are not in the right place. The coffee has been moved too. There’s already water in the coffee maker. I don’t remember puting it in there. My memory is starting to slip. Sometimes I forget where I’m at. I forget that I share this house with you. It seems as though we live opposite lives. Separate lives. We are far apart. We’re growing farther apart.

I think you want to leave me. End this. And, I don’t blame you. I was never good at being a husband. My gluttony has got in the way. Everything done to excess. You should file the papers. End this. You’re the brave one. Always were. I see you standing there in your track suit. Ready for your daily run. We have nothing in common anymore. We are roommates who split rent and utilities. Coffee is ready, I say to you. You shake your head. Telling me you have to run first. You say every day it’s the same thing; you run then come home and drink coffee. I keep forgetting.

Last night there was a bed frame by the dumpsters. A box springs too. This morning it is gone. Mexicans took them in the early morning hours. I thought I heard music playing around five. Mexican music. Guitars and trumpets blaring at five in the morning from tinny speakers. I could barely hear the bass, or, the tuba. A man singing in Spanish. About some love that he’d lost; she abandoned him. Left him behind for another lover. He cried over and over. Wailing about this great loss. He’d never get her back. Her mind was made up. Once they leave, they never come back.

The metal bed frame was tossed in the back of the truck making a racket. The box springs made a thud. I opened my window and saw two men lifting other debris into the back of the truck. Sifting through garbage. Talking about women. Their women. How they’d shoot them if they caught em with another man. The two laughed and opened beers. The truck went on down the alley slowly. The sun was coming up. The sound of gravel under tires went on for a few minutes. The Mexicans vanished. The music faded out. I started my day.

Sitting at my breakfast table I see the frost on the grass from my back window. The ivy on the red brick is turning brown. Leaves are piled up by the side of the road. Soon the City will collect them. All of them gone and then autumn will become winter.

They say we’ll get a lot of snow this year. Weather men say that every year. They start building the drama around Halloween with talk of a white Thanksgiving. Saying we won’t have much of an Indian summer. Then, inevitably, we have a mild sixty degrees on turkey day. You can’t trust anyone.

It is November. There’s talk of a turkey shortage this year due to labor and bird flu. I go to the store and I see bins and bins and bins of frozen gobblers. They go from twelve to twenty-four pounds. They also have turkey breasts. When I was a kid my mom served a whole turkey. Complete with drumsticks. My dad would smoke it outside on the driveway for hours the night before. As I got older my mother started just serving the breast. Disappointments occur as you get older.

Tomorrow morning I will awake to Mexican music again. I’m sure of it. There’s a metal table and an easy chair out by the garbage tonight. By sun up they will be gone. And I’ll drink my coffee, thinking about November. This November and past Novembers as the pick-up slowly moves down the alley and Mexican music fades out.

Waiting for sound. Something to strike a blow to another object. A phone ringing in the middle of the night. Opossum scurrying down the alleyway. Opening trash dumpsters. The lid hits the steel and makes a noise. Waiting for sound.

He laid in bed wanting sleep to take him in. Dead silence. The only noise was his stomach growling. Making sounds of hunger. He had not eaten for two days. Alone that whole time with no noise. It was two o’clock in the morning. The phone rang.

Hello, he said. There was no response. I said, hello, he raised his voice. Still, nothing. Do you want to talk? he asked. Do you have something to say? he demanded. There was nothing on the other end. No breathing, no coughing, not a sneeze, no words. Just silence.

I said hello, he said again. Hello…hello…hello…Are you there? No response. I knew a girl like you once, he stated. She didn’t like to talk either. We would sit there for hours with nothing to say to one another. We didn’t even look at each other in the eyes. We would just sit there on a park bench, or, down in her parent’s basement on the sofa watching television. We wouldn’t laugh. Looked straight forward at the TV. Game shows where people won prizes, he said. The person hung -up.

Hey. Are you there? the phone was dead. Damn thing, he thought. He looked at his clock. Two-thirty in the morning. His stomach still growled. He laid there staring up at the ceiling. The light post outside shined in on his room. His blinds were closed except for a small gap where the light came through. He turned his head and looked at the light shining on his floor. Brown carpet had become yellow. Glowing. The phone rang again.

Look, he said. If you’re going to keep calling I have to know who I’m talking to. It’s just polite that you tell me. Who are you? Again, no response. Is this Rita? Why are you calling me, Rita? Did your man leave you? Are you lonely? Answer me God damn it. Who is this? It’s the middle of the night. Call me back when the sun is out. Say around noon. I’m going to hang up now, he said. On the count of three. One…Two…, again, the person hung up on him.

A train whistle was heard. It was four o’clock in the morning. The phone rang. This time he just let it ring. He did not answer. His stomach growled. He laid there in bed. Looking at the phone. It would not stop ringing.

Drinking coffee in the morning with curtains open. One day you wake up and they’re all gone. Every leaf has fallen. Sidewalks are filled with golds, rust, yellows, brown. Sprigs of grass with dew on them. November, 1st is tomorrow.

Sounds of concrete mixers rolling down the streets. Garbage trucks beeping as they back-up. A cop car zooms past. Some things never change. Same as yesterday and the day before. Noise. I look at the leaves for peace.

And upstairs a man and woman argue over breakfast. He complains because his coffee is cold. She says, Get a coffee maker that works. This leads into his lack of employment and her inabilities to make a decent cup of joe. I guess each have a valid point.

Kids walk down the sidewalk kicking the leaves; wrestling in the leaves; laughing till it turns ugly. Two children team up on one. Burying him in the colors of autumn. He begins to cry. They mock him. Bully him. No one is there for his rescue. I watch without opening my window and saying a word. I’m no parent. Not an authority figure.

The buried child is left behind. He lays there in the leaves soaked…wet. The day of Halloween and he was tricked. Tricked into thinking he had friends. Comrades to count on. He brushes the leaves off of him. Grabs his backpack and continues his march to school. I drink my coffee as the rain begins to fall.

Looking east in the morning sun. A junkyard filled with rusted out Chevys, broken down Dodge, Fords with floorboards busted out, old pickup trucks split in two, a chained pit bull barks.

The old man sits there on a step eating cornbread and milk. A cup of coffee is next to him. His teeth are missing. He sings the song I’ll Fly Away in a baritone voice. He can’t pronounce the words so he hums most of it.

Morning dew covers junk out back in the yard. Radiator caps and tail pipes on the ground. Torn milk crates and buckets of screws, bolts, nuts, and wing nuts mixed together spill over onto a blue plastic sheet. Dog shit everywhere.

Sifting through junk, a metal cross is found by a young Mexican kid looking for a rear view mirror. He picks it up and holds the silver piece up to the sun. Says something in Latin. Ends by saying Amen and crossing himself . He carries the cross to the old man. How much? he asks. The old man looks at it carefully. Waves his hand. Says, you owe me nothing. The Mexican nods his head. Says bless you in Spanish and walks out. The dog looks at him in silence.

I’ll fly away old glory….I’ll fly away, the old man hums. I’ll fly away. When I die Hallelujah by and by….I’ll fly away….

We talked. Spoke very few words.  It’d been awhile. Years. She looked different. Not the same as when we were married. She’d lost weight. Her breasts were smaller. Hips, thin. Neck looked strained. And her lips were not normal size. Overtaken by Botox. She smiled. I smiled. Her eyes were still blue.

I was not the picture of health. Overweight, dark circles under eyes. Hair tangled and long. I stopped caring. Maybe that’s what happened to us; stopped caring.

It was on a park bench in Chelsea where we sat. She was on her lunch break. I was permanently broken. Her eyes danced. She could not look at me. She saw through me. Always looking for the better option.

There was small talk. Senseless chatter. How have you been? was asked by both of us. Did we mean it? I don’t know. Seemed hollow. I threw bread at the birds. She pointed to a sign, DON’T FEED THE PIGEONS. We laughed. Always correcting me.

She placed her hand on my knee. I gotta go now, she said. It was good to see you. I nodded. There was no awkward embrace. Just two people saying goodbye.

Hair gets longer; unkempt. Beard grows in gray. Dark circles under eyes from nights without sleep. Bones begin to rattle.

Body hurts. Walking down streets in the city have become a task. New York is a young man’s game. The climbing of subway stairs. A stroll on Lexington Avenue becomes a hike. Millions of people to sift through. Punching and pulling. Jousting for position. No one has ever waited for the light to turn green. A constant stampede.

And bars are filled with youth and tourists. Moneymakers paying with credit cards. Craft beers in front of them. I drink my shot and Carlsberg. Left Malort and Old Style far behind.

Bronx girls wait on corners. Pimps sit in cars. Arabs in stores buying food stamps, selling loosies for a quarter, homeless guys waiting by the ATM. Is it the first of the month yet?

Too old for all of this. Time to settle down. Take a bus from New York heading anywhere; South, Midwest, a small town; slower speeds. It is time. It is time.

The cupboards were almost bare. Some rice and canned beans on the bottom shelf. A box of various teas on top. Dust was everywhere. It covered shelves, cabinets, books, pots, pans, highball glasses, and the desk that he sat at to write this letter which never got mailed.

I found it in the knife drawer amongst sharp blades and can openers. A book of matches were in there as well. Said, Meet Me At Henry’s, on the cover. Inside was a telephone number. It was written in red ink with a drawing of lips above. I lit a candle with one of the matches just to see if it would still strike. A blue and yellow flame touched the candle’s wick. The room was illuminated.

Dear Jessica, the letter started. I write to you from a house that’s in complete disarray. Lazy and depressed. No cleaning has been done in months. Everything reeks of smoke and the plants have long since died. They were too much for me to take care of, he wrote. I miss having you here. It was always a joy to see you in the morning. Coffee downstairs in the breakfast nook was always a great way to start the day. But, nothing lasts forever. I don’t know why I did the things I did, or, say the words I said. It all seems so confusing now. That being said, I’m sorry for my actions that caused the end of our marriage, he wrote in cursive. I’ll send you this letter when I’m ready to face my actions. Until that time, take care. I am truly ashamed. Love, Paul.

This letter had pictures of the two dancing, posing with arms around each other, laughing. It made me think that at one time they were happy. Or, in love. What sins did he commit against the sacred vows? Hard to say.But, it must have cut deep.

He hid everything about them in that drawer. I placed the letter and photos in a shoe box. I buried it in the closet with my own history. Sometimes I read the letter and look at the pictures of the happy couple. We often regret the things we do.

Sitting in a coffee house looking at art on the walls, umbrellas hang from the ceiling. Rap music plays and the skinny white girl nods her head as she pours a latte. Front windows are smashed. Yellow caution tape stretches across the frames. A wooden board stands in place, saying, We Are Still Open.

The plants are real. So real they look plastic. Bright, shiny green, standing tall in pots of lavender, gold, and white. Leaves have blown in from the front door. Autumn is here.

Soon winter will come. I wonder if the plants will survive. Or, just be replaced. The same with the front windows; will they be replaced?

I asked the girl behind the counter what happened? She nods her head still to the hip hop sounds. Not sure, she says. Vandalism, she raises her shoulders.

Yeah. I guess so.

That’ll be $3.79 for your coffee.

Hotels with vacancy signs in red. Old run down buildings. A whore on every corner. He lit a cigarette and looked around. Homeboys drove by blasting bass and rap. A sneaker dangles over a power line. Liquor store lit up with flashing signs. A bum asked for a buck.

Two blocks down a sign read, Shrimps and Catfish nuggets. The food is served through a slot at the bottom of bullet proof glass. He reads the menu on the wall. Tells the Arab he’ll take a half pound of shrimps and a Faygo Grape. The blacks stared at his white skin.

The Arab called out his order and shoved it through the square hole. Before he reached the door the old man began eating his fried food. Two teens followed him out the door. He sensed that this will be a showdown.

Hey man, one of the kids said. You gotta dollar? Help a brother out, the old man kept walking. I said you got a buck motherfucker? the pace quickens. Yo slow down bitch. Ain’t nobody gonna hurt ya, the teen with the cocked hat said. Let me use your phone, the old man turned around. Half of his right arm reached into a leather jacket.

Yo man. I’m just asking if I can use your phone. Sides, you ain’t got no gun in there. The old white man stared them down. Kept his hand inside his jacket.

You wanna find out? he asked.

Yeah bitch. I’m calling you out. Show us what you got. A pistol was pulled from his coat. The old man pointed right at them. Shots were fired. The two of them laid out on the sidewalk. Blood dripped from their mouths. The old man kept walking.