Writer: Thomas Sullivan

Meeting the Suburban Gangbanger

It's my first lesson of the morning, but I'm already in a rough mood. Teaching seven or eight lessons day after day is like driving to Seattle and back on a daily basis. Given my random crop of students, it's like spending each day with a series of cabbies whose skills you don't quite trust.
I'm checking out the wheels on my car while I wait for a new student. With my faith in fleet maintenance plummeting, I'm starting each lesson with an assessment of the tires and an inspection under the car for mysterious fluid stains on the pavement. Today's assigned vehicle, a sad looking heap of dilapidated metal, is new to me, so we're about to embark on our maiden voyage together. I have no idea where the red Mazda came from, and really don't want to know. It's probably up from New Orleans after hurricane Katrina. The car looks like something even a suicide bomber would reject.
I see a kid wearing an oversized NBA jersey and slinky nylon shorts shuffling towards me. As he gets closer I notice that his huge high-top sneakers are unlaced. This is one suburban white kid who's having nothing to do with the standard attire of his town.
"You the teach?" he says.
I nod and look at his head. He's got a baseball hat yanked down to the bottom of his forehead, so I can't see his eyes.
When the second student shows up, the kid swings away from me.
"Yo Slice, wassup bro!" he shouts.
They slap a high-five and laugh. I wait for a break in their jibing and posturing to start the lesson, but they ignore my presence. A minute later I interrupt them and we load into the car. Slice loads into the back seat while his buddy slumps behind the wheel. The kid shifts the backrest on the seat toward the rear of the car and slumps, ghetto style, with one arm stretched out to the wheel. I manage to get his seat more upright, but he resists advancing to the vertical position, so we compromise on a quasi-gangster setting.
I get a glimpse of my face while I adjust the rearview mirror. I look like someone you could feed on Thanksgiving for a contribution of $2.16. I glance over at my driver and ask, "Ready?" Head facing forward, he responds by jabbing his right hand toward the windshield and saying nothing.
The kid bolts away from the curb without bothering to check for traffic. I emphasize the need to steer with both hands and he grudgingly complies. A minute into our drive the kid drops his left arm off the wheel and resumes steering with his right. I'm about to correct this when a police cruiser passes us on the other side of the road. The kid lifts his left hand to the window, flicks two fingers forward, and says, "Mr. Baaacon." He whips his head toward the back seat and glances at Slice, who laughs apprehensively.
"Okay," I interrupt, "let's keep our eyes on the road. And use both hands."
The kid sighs theatrically and puts his second hand back on the wheel. Looking through the windshield he says, "Yo, got it." He seems to be relishing the show for his buddy in the back. I decide to let the police comment slide, hoping he's now got the need for posing out of his system. We continue rolling down the road. He's actually a pretty good driver, though I notice that he prefers not to signal, probably as a means to retain street cred.
Ten minutes later we swing right at an intersection and start rolling down a four-lane road. My driver looks out his side window and stares toward the curb across the street. Looking past him I spot a woman in a tight blouse and skirt lugging a big shopping bag down the sidewalk. Still gazing through the window he says, "Yo, Slice, did ya feel the heat comin' offa dat one." Slice laughs, less hesitant than the last time.
That's it.
"Okay, pull the car over, onto this road here," I order. I jab my fist in the air, pointing to our right.
The kid peels onto the road, races up to the curb, and grinds to a stop. I reach down and shove the gear shifter into park. It's silent for a moment as I compose my thoughts. I look over at my junior gangbanger, who turns his head towards me. I still can't see his eyes and fight the urge to reach over and flick the hat off his head.
"Look," I say sternly, "you're here to impress me with your driving, not Slice with your comments."
The kid tilts his head back and our eyes meet for the first time. He looks at me with dull indifference, like I'm a principal he couldn't give two shits about. I feel like a flustered stepfather trying to deal with the resentment buried in some other guy's neglected spawn.
"Okay?" I ask, softening my voice into a pleading tone.
Sensing that the gig's up, the kid shifts to English and says, "Okay, got it."
We proceed quietly through the remainder of the lesson without incident. I try to encourage my driver, periodically commenting on things he does well. He's probably had fifteen years of adults focusing on what he does wrong. A half-hour later we finish the lesson. It's the last time we'll meet.

© Thomas Sullivan 2011

Thomas Sullivan’s writing has appeared in Word Riot and 3AM Magazine, among others. He is the author of Life In The Slow Lane, a memoir about teaching driver education. For information on this title, please visit his author website at http://thomassullivanhumor.com.

Guest Writer: Eric G. Müller

Debut

I sat at the back of the packed hall, waiting for my turn to perform a duet with the resident flautist. We were last on the program, the highlight of the evening – the finale. It would be my formal debut into the new school community, both as a teacher and accompanist. It would also be my debut playing a classical piece after ten years of rock and roll, but that bit of info I kept to myself.

Financial desperation and a tad of hubris led me to take the job as a piano accompanist at the school where my wife had graduated. There was an opening and I auditioned. As a kid I’d taken piano lessons for a couple of years, but I gave that up to play guitar. I went back to the piano when I noticed most rock bands needed keyboardists. I played by ear and improvised, emulating maestros like Rick Wakeman, Keith Emerson, Vangelis and Chick Corea. After my stint as a rock musician I resumed my academic studies, going to grad school where I met my wife. She played the violin, and in order to accompany her, I decided to learn how to read music again. By the time I auditioned I could play two pieces by heart. I only pretended I could read the music, and my renditions of Schumann’s “Von fremden Ländern und Menshen,” and a Chopin nocturne were only so-so. But they loved my improvisations. I got the job and now had to pay my dues.

The air was stuffy, the program too long, and my solar plexus shot nervous currents up my spinal cord. I hadn’t wanted to play with Mrs. Googlin. She was the best flautist around and I didn’t feel ready to play publicly yet, especially not a piece by Bach; the driving polyphonic texture confused my fingers. But she assured me it was very simple and that I would have no trouble at all. She’d heard me play a few times at different events – coffee houses, parties, cabarets, weddings – but each time I’d played by ear, or improvised. She thought I was brilliant, and besides, she couldn’t find anybody else. I yielded.

And now I was mentally preparing myself, going over every note in my mind, imagining my fingers flitting with precision over the keys. The children were getting increasingly restless and the program was never-ending.

I’d practiced like mad. I learned the whole thing by heart (my third piece). I played it ad nauseam, to the exasperation of wife and neighbors. But when I rehearsed together with Mrs. Googlin I still faltered. She assured me that I’d be fine. “And you still have a few days to perfect your playing.” We hadn’t practiced since, and now I was stuck in this stifling concert hall, waiting to go on.

At last our turn came. Amidst applause we stepped on stage. As I sat down by the grand piano she whispered to me, “Whatever you do, don’t stop. Just keep on playing.” I nodded. The expectant silence set in. My head was filled with noxious smog after the long wait and the lack of ventilation (too much carbon dioxide). Mrs. Googlin nodded and I began.

Not three measures into the piece and I made my first mistake. I should have stopped right there, smiled, breathed deeply and started again (after all I had rehearsed it hundreds of times), but I didn’t, because she’d told me not to. At the flute entrance my blunders began to multiply, and my clammy hands started trembling, but I didn’t stop – just like when I used to play with the band, Tokolosh. I was their keyboardist and frontman. We were an unstoppable sonic avalanche even when we witnessed fights and melees erupting in the mosh pit, or when tables, chairs and bottles went flying in clubs and bars. I used to strut across the stage like Jagger and scream like Led Zeppelin’s Robert Plant. I postured and played the part of the proverbial rock star; I was a demigod backed by an arsenal of amps and a towering PA system. And who cared about mistakes, anyway? It was part of the metal grit we hurled at the gyrating mass beyond the blinding spotlights. But now I cared, each blatant error drawing blood.

She played beautifully, though her silvery notes did not coincide with mine. I was not even sure whether we were following the same measures or tempo. The hall had become a morgue, and I was hyper perceptive to the audience’s sudden attentiveness as they listened to the gradual tonal implosion. Her words propelled me forward. So I adhered to the credo: the show must go on!

By now I was utterly lost, though I scurried around the key of E flat major like a beheaded turkey, hoping to find my way back to the melodic path – anywhere along the way would do. Pleadingly I glanced up at the formidable Mrs. Googlin, but she tooted right on, playing with fierce determination – no stopping this iron-woman. And where was that flagrant rocker, oozing with self-confidence? By now Bach had morphed into an atonal collage of chance encounters between distorted sharps, flats and accidentals crashing into one another – 4’33” of noise. Children began to snicker, which underscored the expanding, oppressive mood surrounding the inexorable butchering of Bach.

I leaned forward, swaying with the music, as if it was heart-wrenchingly moving. All the while I felt the sweat run down my face and neck, seeping through my scalp, draining into my collar, trickling down my chest and back, soaking my shirt. The piece in its entirety was hardly five minutes long, but I’d begun to understand the concept of eternal hell and damnation. As heavy metal macho-men we used to conjure forth doom and gloom images for show, but now I was living it – payback time. I was plunging down a precipice, head first, feeling the fatal pull of gravity.

At last I heard Mrs. Googlin play the final long, soft notes, and I knew we’d arrived at the end. I played the last chord in unison with her, but even at this moment I struck a minor instead of a major chord. At least it was played molte piano.

Amidst isolated and perfunctory clapping, Mrs. Googlin walked off in a huff. I, in turn, got up, grabbed my score and took cover behind the black grand, fumbling with a plastic bag I found on the floor. Thus occupied, scrunching my music into the dusty bag, I waited till everybody had left, before sneaking out the back entrance – a fallen rock star. For a moment I'd thought of apologizing, of seeking her out, but then her voice resounded in my ears, "Whatever you do, don't stop."

© Eric G. Müller 2011

Eric G. Müller is a musician, teacher and writer. He has written two novels, Rites of Rock (Adonis Press 2005) and Meet Me at the Met (Plain View Press, 2010), as well as a collection of poetry, Coffee on the Piano for You (Adonis Press, 2008). Articles, short stories and poetry have appeared in various journals and magazines.
www.ericgmuller.com

Guest Writer: Bill Floyd

Horror Novels and Real Terror
A Halloween Special

Bill committed to posting one piece per day on the Six Sentence Social Network throughout the month of October, all related to subjects associated with Halloween or autumn in general. All the archetypes made an appearance: monsters, ghosts, haunted houses, unstoppable slashers; there was a mix of fiction and essay and memoir, nostalgic evocations of his youth with its toxic costumes and wanton juvenile delinquency; and there were recurring themes and characters, all adding up to some ghoulish good fun in the spirt of whistling past the graveyard, which is what the season is all about.

[The preceding is adapted from his introduction to the series, and the following posted on 11 and 12 October, and 23 October, nicely sum up his influences and inspiration. –MDJB]

Paperback Horror Novels, Part 1
By the time I left for college, I must have accumulated hundreds of titles, all of them crammed into the bookshelves of my bedroom: books by John Farris, Stephen King, Ramsey Campbell, Charles L. Grant, Peter Straub, Clive Barker, H.P. Lovecraft, Harlan Ellison, Edgar A. Poe, Dean Koontz, Ray Bradbury. A boy's club for sure, and most likely marketed directly at my lonely, alienated teen-aged ass, but they did their duty, seeing me through innumerable solitary afternoons and nights, at first because I had no choice in the matter and then maybe a bit obsessively and unhealthily later on when I'd made some flesh-and-blood friends. My own nascent forays into writing were poorly disguised rip-offs of Jaws and The Shining, at first handwritten and then pounded out (and I do mean pounded) on my grandmother's old manual typewriter, one of those cast-iron beasts with a carriage that would shift the entire desk to one side when you palmed the lever to return it. Most of my work was derivative and hackneyed (and some would say not much has changed!) but I was learning to be the very thing I wanted to be, at least if I couldn't actually inhabit all those stories as a vampire-vanquishing hero. I hadn't yet realized that all those ghosts and monsters were just stand-ins for the really scary things in life. But those books helped me navigate nonetheless, they kept me from channeling the anguish and helplessness I felt into real-world violence or perversion, so seriously guys (many of whom I now realize probably did not make much money off this stuff at all) THANK YOU for pretty much saving my life.

Paperback Horror Novels, Part 2
It felt like autumn just opening one of those books, whose covers ranged from the lurid to the abstract. A company named TOR published a lot of them, although at the time even mainstream publishers were not afraid to sully themselves with a title here and there, given Stephen King's ascendency. (Another offshoot of the "King Effect" was that every other novel was entitled The ______, as in The Wolfen, The Glow, The Tribe, The Fury, The Manitou, The Cipher, The Nesting, etc.)
As for the quality of the work, well, in my memory John Farris's Son of the Endless Night and Peter Straub's Shadowland still thrill (although the less said about Straub's most recent work, A Dark Matter, the better) along with a few books by Kathe Koja and Clive Barker.
I mostly outgrew the genre in my early 20's, but without these novels to instill in me the love of prose and character and imagination, I would never have discovered the likes of Pynchon, DeLillo, Atwood, Wallace, Gaddis, McCarthy, Morrison, or Updike.
Autumn is forever calling to me, autumn echoes down the years, every night when I open whatever book I am currently reading and offer up a prayer for the mid-list and the genre aficionados whose hunger carries the rest of the industry through its troughs and then they stand fuming on the sidelines, relegated yet again to the literary ghetto when the market rebounds.

Real Terror
Of course we all know it's only cartoons. None of these movies or novels or sixes is anywhere near as frightening as what is right outside the door, or just beneath the skin.
Car crashes; cowards with guns or missiles or suicide vests and the whole world coming down around them; the tumor blotting the x-ray like a misshapen egg floating in the dark sea of the surrounding tissue.
Our cartoons help us manage the real fear so it's not so damned insurmountable and debilitating; our cathartic diversions prompt the development of tools that assist us in confronting the day-to-day world in all its dire reality. Otherwise we would be paralyzed, reduced to shambling shock-sufferers drowning in our own thousand-yard stares, because every living thing has been due its own judgment day since the Big went Bang.
Autumn calls us each in turn, and sometimes the only way to sustain the fading light is by throwing shadows.

© William Floyd 2010

Bill Floyd is a writer from North Carolina who is feeling his way around the on-line world of micro-fiction. He blogs occasionally at Six Sentences, and you can check out the rest of his terrific October Series by clicking here.

Guest Writer: Bolton Carley

Crazy Is As Crazy Does

Seriously, everybody’s got one. No matter how hard you try to hide it, people find out. Accept it. There’s a whack-job in your family, and you better consider yourself lucky if it’s not you. The only thing worse than dealing with crazy is realizing that you exist in a whole family of fruitcakes. Oh, how little my husband and I knew when we united two sets of freak-shows. But wow! We got more than we bargained for! All I can tell you is that there’s been plenty of praying in our house since our families collided. Sometimes we thank Him for seeing us through and sometimes we wonder how He created us from the same loins.

“Normal” is not a term fit for our household. There are only “typical” days in our world. Quite frankly, I think Tony and I agree that we’d jump at “normal” anytime. But alas, our days are one giant cluster after another. Like today, I made the mistake of answering the phone. Why’d I do it? Yeah, I’m still asking myself that same question. I guess I was feeling guilt from the last five calls I conveniently “missed”. After all, I’m not a rude person by nature, and it is his mother. Or as he prefers to refer to her: my mother-in-law. (he quit claiming her the day he could start passing her off on to me.) Anyway, I picked up the phone to the sound of a cuckoo-cachoo, and I ain’t talkin’ about no bird, unless you guessed a loon. She was already blathering before I could get hello out of my mouth. Boy, sometimes I wonder if the crazy fairies just actively swarm around her with the brilliant ideas she bestows upon us. Discussions with her leave me wondering if Tony was mixed up at birth. Sometimes, I bemoan my interactions with her, but I know it doesn’t hold a candle to the way Tone reacts when I share the conversations with him. I think he cringes when he hears her name.

I figured I’d better break the news ASAP. “Hey Tone, your mom called today.”

As my poor husband rolled his eyes, he said, “You handled it, didn’t you?”

“No, I told her you’d be home by eight. She’s all yours.”

“Thanks a lot. I see how it is. No loyalty. She is your mother-in-law, you know. You could take one for the team.”

I didn’t have the heart to make him think he’d have to chat with her tonight so I coughed up the dirt. “Yeah, yeah, yeah. I did take care of it, even though I should have left you hung out to dry. She was in rare form.”

“Dare I ask?” came with a “I’d-rather-be-hit-by-a-herd-of-wild-buffalo” look.

“You know your mother. She’s decided to sell her house because she can buy a big fancy-shmancy house for practically nothing in this economy. Never mind that she has to sell her house first.”

Tony’s cheeks puffed like a squirrel, his fists clinched involuntarily, and a raised voice responded, “She’s selling our house?”

“That’s what she said. But, don’t worry honey, it gets better!”

“What?” his exasperation exploding like a balloon pop. I’m pretty sure he didn’t want to ask, but it was scarier to not know the rest.

“She’s decided that to sell her house, it needs to look different than everybody else’s. In her infinite wisdom, she thinks that painting the house lavender and having an artist paint flowers all over it like a work of art will make her house the best one on the block.”

I got a blank stare, followed by, “You’re kidding, right?”

“This is your mother. Do you really think I’m kidding? Do you think I’d come up with that on my own?” Okay, so maybe I shouldn’t have been quite so harsh. But seriously, what mother would think to do that????

“Okay, but you said you handled it. What exactly did you say?” Calm seemed to be restored again on my husband’s face. I like to think it was his false sense of confidence in me.

“I told her it would probably cost a lot of time and money to get somebody to paint all those flowers and that maybe she could just have one really special painting done that we could frame and put on the porch, next to the door.”

My husband looked at me funny. “And she agreed to that?”

“Well, it took some convincing, but when I agreed to get the house paint picked up and find a painter, she bit on it like a pit bull. You know her – if she can get us to take care of the real work, she’ll agree to almost anything.” Again, I might have been a little mean, but obviously, it was the truth.

“Did you really agree to paint the house lavender?” Skepticism oozed from Tony.

“Well, that’s what I agreed to. But you and I both know that she’s half color-blind. I figure I’ll find a shade of gray that looks lavender in the right light and make sure the painter refers to it as lavender, and we’re all good.” It seemed the best plan of attack to me.

There was almost a half-smile when he sucked up with, “I knew I was smart to marry you.”

“Yeah, you married me so that your family would look sane!” We have to laugh in our house about these things even though if we really thought about it, we’d be more likely to cry and drink heavily.

“Speaking of your family…” Tony gave me “the look” reserved for the supremely outlandish family faux pas.

Apparently, it was my turn. “Uh-oh. What else happened today?” I already had thousands of scenarios popping into my head. None of them good.

“Your brother stopped by. His company is sending him to Arizona to work for a month.”

“Woo-hoo! That’s something to be excited about! Can you even imagine how nice it will be without all of Peter’s drama for a month?” I can see it now. We might actually be able to visit my dad without one of my brother’s many lady-callers moaning in the basement.

“Don’t get ahead of yourself.” Believe me, I know that expression of doom.

“Why? What’s the problem?” horror, anticipation, and panic were setting in on me like vultures to a dead animal.

“There’s a little matter of the boys.”

“What do you mean ‘little matter’? He isn’t taking them with him?” Now my voice was sky-rocketing upward.

“They’re in school, honey. It’s not like he can take them out for a month without anybody noticing.” Oh, they’d notice. They’d probably be thrilled, but this can only mean one thing…

“So let me guess: we’re taking care of the boys while Peter’s gone, huh?”

“Winner, winner, chicken dinner. Give the lady a prize!” Sarcasm might be one of husband’s strongest assets, but also his most annoying quality in a situation like this. I glared at him.

“When does he leave?” I asked, not really wanting to know the answer.

“Oh, baby. When did you think? He’s leaving tomorrow, of course.”

Shrieking, I replied, “WHAT?” My husband had the good sense to just not respond at this point. I wasn’t kidding. There’s an insane one in every group, except in our family where every single one is half-cocked. I’d like to tell you that it hasn’t always been that way, but I can’t. The funny part is, well, there isn’t really a funny part.

Luckily, my husband and I have come to the logical conclusion that we will do our best to survive in any given family catastrophe, make fun of them at nauseam, and then hide in our own house until the crisis is over. We’d also like to figure out how to bucket up sanity, but that’s one of those things on the to-do list that just never quite gets done. And there was no use discussing this any further, I simply sighed and said, “So, I better get the guest bedrooms ready, huh? Did you buy some extra cereal?”

A teddy bear grin shown my way, as Tony held up a box and a bottle. “Fruit Loops and Jack Daniels. I think we’re all set.” Boy, do I love my husband.

It takes a brave man to walk into the face of disaster every day, day in and day out, and that’s why at times like these, I can only bow down to my knees on a cold tile kitchen floor and pray,

“Dear Lord, thank you for giving us this house 15 miles away, our marriage of sound minds (although I’m not sure how long that will last at this rate), and the ability to find humor in freight-train wrecks. Please look after our families. Help us to have good health, safety, and happiness. Grant us the strength to survive our family dilemmas, the money to afford all their debacles, and the patience to not kill them. Amen.”

© Bolton Carley 2010

Bolton Carley mostly writes young adult books like her verse novel, Hello, Summer Vacay! which can be purchased on Amazon, but she has branched out to flash fiction and blogging at www.boltoncarley.wordpress.com.

Guest Writer: j guevara

Bro

Having a knack at raising money – for other people – I got 'volunteered' to be on the local Big Brothers of America board of directors – ‘Managing Director, fund raising’. Although I consented, I refused to bend to their persistent pestering to take on a ‘Little’, as the organization affectedly calls them. I had no desire to deal with some lost, unfortunate juvenile, with a life already out-of-luck before his teens. Hey, it’s a tough world.
The 'Pizza Festival' netted $600, but the 1st annual Big Brothers’ golf tournament promised to do better. To give it more legitimacy the committee felt the ‘Littles’ should take part. The problem was the ‘Littles’ were too little. "How ‘bout adding a putting contest?" I suggested. End of problem.
The morning of the tournament, Pat called. Pat, the most cunning, underhanded sneakiest woman I’ve ever known, had one goal in life: get me to accept a ‘Little’. She was relentless, though I had to admit, no one was better at pairing ‘Bigs’ and ‘Littles’. She could pick a perfect match at a hundred yards, in the dark, connive you into that match, and have you thinking it was your own decision.
Knowing that, I should have been on high alert. But it was early Sunday morning, bad hangover; she caught me off guard. A ‘Little’ needed a ride, she said, and it was on my way; could I please pick him up in time for the contest? No problem, I thought. I thought wrong.
It was pouring rain. I barely tooted the horn when out came this skinny little whelp dodging puddles with the agility of a first-string half-back, leaping toys and hedge like a track star. I leaned over and cracked the door. He jumped in dripping wet, water running down his stringy blond hair, over his youthful face of pre-puberty innocence, past a wide smile full of teeth, and onto my new $200 leather seat covers. Not an auspicious beginning.
With barely a ‘howdy’ he laid into a machine gun chatter with enough details to stymie a mainframe. In fewer minutes than his age – eleven – I knew his whole life story. Twice! Steve didn’t just worm his way into your heart; he jack-hammered his way in.
 When we reached the golf course the rain had stopped, clouds parted, and Pat was waving for us to hurry, the putting contest was about to begin.
About twenty ‘Littles’ prepared for the elimination rounds. Some were shorter than the putter, so they'd be out soon. At least they got to compete, which was the whole idea, right? The ‘Littles’ thought otherwise. To them, this was the PGA.
Round by round the mini-midgets were eliminated. Some groaned, other moaned, a few threw a fit. The adults tried to calm them with admonitions about being good sports. I was no help quoting Vince Lombardi: "Show me a good loser, and I’ll show you a loser."
It wasn’t long before it became obvious whom it would come down to. Steve was definitely a front-runner. He had a steady hand, good concentration, coordination, and a nice smooth stroke for his age. Steve was a natural athlete; lack of confidence was his only setback.
The other contender was a wiseass, too big for his age and his britches; a dough ball, a foot taller and two feet wider than his peers, who’d go through life thinking 'clever' is the same as 'intelligent'. He was sharp, he knew it, and didn’t hesitate to use it. Every round he’d bully his way to go first. He understood psychology. Unfortunately for him, so did I.
As expected, it boiled down to Big Butt and Steve. Before final round, they took a break. Steve had already resigned himself to second-place. He was satisfied with that. The kid had two years on him; Steve didn’t think he stood a chance. I took him off to the side and gave him a crash course in Psych 101.
“Look, the trick is to go first,” I said. “Whoever goes first has no pressure. Even if it takes 10 putts, number two still has to beat that. Therefore, number two is under pressure. That’s how he’s winning; he’s not that good. He’s counting on you beating yourself. He’s gone first every round. Stand up to him and demand he let somebody else go first for a change.”
Steve gazed up at me with his wide smile and the most incredible gleam in his bright blue eyes; a look I will never forget. It was as though in his mind I was the smartest, most all-knowing person he would ever meet. I was Apollo, Zeus, and Thor all rolled into one. For that brief moment, I actually thought I could command lightning, wind and thunder. It felt good, of course, until it dawned on me what a heavy burden that is. Like I said, I’m nobody’s big brother, and I sure as hell was not interested in the role of God.
The final round was ready to begin. Big Butt muscled his way to the green ready to take his putt. I stood watching. Steve was nervous, a little scared, he was on his own. He started to back away, then glanced over at me watching to see what he would do. He’d resigned himself back to second-place. Ashamed he had to let me down, his sad face begged me to understand. For once, I wished I was God; maybe then I could forgive him.
Instead, I looked up at the sky and shook my head in disappointment. That was all Steve needed to see. The next thing I heard was this little guy’s voice trying to sound strong, exerting his rights against all odds for the first time in the real world.
“Wait! I think I should go first. I’m younger, he’s older. He’s gone first every time.”
“What difference does it make?” Big Butt shouted.
“Good,” said Steve, crowding his way to the green, and nudging his opponent aside, “since it doesn’t make any difference to you, I’ll just go ahead and go first.”
Calm, cool, steady, deep breath, eyes glued to the ball, putter squared to the cup, heels locked, knees slightly bent, back straight, just as he’d seen on television.
Butt had a ‘Big’ somewhere in the crowd; I’d already scoped him out, casually made my way over, and stood with arms folded next to him. With both of us focused on the action, I leaned toward him slightly and said out of the corner of my mouth, “Five bucks he wins.”
‘Big’ looked at me, rolled his eyes, laughed, and said, “Make it ten.”
One stroke, two strokes, three strokes, contact, follow through, the ball rolled over the green straight for the cup. A thirty-foot putt-in-one by an eleven-year-old was too good to believe …so I didn’t. Nevertheless, it got pretty darn close. Five feet, still not an easy putt. Steve squared off to do it again.
One stroke, two strokes, three strokes, contact, follow through, and again the ball rolled over the green straight for the cup. Only this time there was no doubt where it was gonna end up. It was headin’ for home. It hit the cup slightly off-center and started to drop after it circled the edge a time or two. Centrifugal force took over, however, and the ball made an exit stage right.
There it sat, less than a blade of grass away from the cup looking as sad as the sigh from the crowd. I tried with everything I had to call forth my power to command the wind. Forget lightning and thunder, one small breeze was all it would take. Just this one time, and I promised never to ask again. Apollo, Zeus, and Thor all turned a deaf ear.
Without ceremony, Steve didn’t even bother to square up; a light tap put it in. He then slung that putter over his shoulder, strutted off the green right past his opponent, and without a pause looked dead up at him, and said, “Next.”
At last count, it was 16 and the ball was nowhere near the cup. The putting contest was over, but in frustrated determination, the poor kid had turned it into a contest with himself. It was difficult not to feel pity, for that is one contest you can never win.
Steve picked up his trophy, I picked up my ten, and we headed back for home. He sat silently holding his prize. We were both too proud to talk. After awhile, Steve turned towards me, smiled, and said, “You know, this trophy belongs to both of us, Bro.”
What a word, I thought. ‘Bro.’ Just by the tone he used, the feeling he expressed when he said it, it defined a relationship between two men like no other. The word has had special meaning to me ever since. I’m not your dad, I’m not your brother, I’m not even your friend. I'm your Bro.
It’s been nineteen years since that day, and Steve still calls me Bro.

      ...and no, I did not split the ten.

Epilogue

What became of Steve?

Somehow, I ended up with legal custody and helped him get through his later teen-years. As difficult as that was, I never would have imagined that skinny-ass, beanpole, nail-biting, pimple face would grow up to become a 'Ford Agency' high-fashion model traveling the world first-class on their dime, making around $3000. a day. And, between dates he conducts seminars for top CEO's on... 'Confidence Building'.

       ...and no, he does not split the three-grand. 

© j guevara 2010

j guevara assures me this story is all true. j, also known as that green, caffeine-jacked muppet, KAWFEEE, is the author of the top-selling novel The Twain Shall Meet to be followed in May 2010 by his Himalayan adventure, The Keepers of Himal. You can visit his website at http://www.jguevaranovels.com.

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