Jimmy Johnson was born into the cold of a late fall morning, in his single mother’s bedroom. Aided by his three aunts, with old rags and a tin bucket of warm water, he opened his eyes to a new world. He, his mother and his aunts all cried, each for different reasons. Thirty four years later, Slimmy J closed his eyes to an old world. Nobody cried.

Leonard sat on the hillside overlooking the park, finishing a half-pint of whiskey in the damp grass. The night was clear, he wished his mind would be that way. He’d come here many times in his years of homelessness. He always came alone–always, and only when he’d lost one of his friends. The park was as empty as Slimmy J’s alley. And that’s why he came here. He took the last shot of whiskey and, dropping the bottle, laid back waiting for the ghosts to whisper in his ear stories of a life past.

Out of the alcohol, upon the wind they came, and carried him to another hill, in another time.

“Look,” Leonard pointed to a dot of star-like light, “it’s a satellite.”

Lauren looked in the direction of his finger. Her young eyes, much sharper than his.

“See it, moving across the sky there. It looks like a star.”

“Oh yeah!”

He loved her enthusiasm. It reminded him of a place he hadn’t been since he was a kid. A place where anything was possible, where imagination hadn’t been dowsed by commercials, bosses, taxes, products… She lived in a place where dreams were as real as the blades of grass poking them through the blanket.

“What’s a satt’ite?”

Leonard cringed. This wasn’t going to be easy, “It’s a machine that floats around the earth, like the moon.”

“Why do they do that?”

He felt himself getting into a quagmire that would make Vietnam look like a lazy day in the park.

“People use them to talk to each other and to figure out where they are.”

“How do they do that?”

He pondered a moment.

“Well, hold out your hands. Hold them up in the air.”

She lifted her small hands and giggled.

He lightly pinched her left hand, “Imagine this hand is a mountain.”

She giggled again.

He pinched her right hand, “Imagine this hand is a person on the other side of the mountain. Now keep holding your hands so they’re lined up.”

He turned on the flashlight and aimed it at her left hand, “Now imagine this hand,” He pinched his left hand holding the flashlight, “is a person that wants to send a message to your hand. See, the mountain is in the way and your person can’t see the light.”

“Okay.”

He held up his can of Coke and held it over her hand, “Now, imagine this is a satellite.” He aimed the flashlight at the can, adjusting it until the light reflected onto her right hand, “See, I can bounce the light off the satellite, over the mountain, and your person can see it now.”

“OH!” Her eyes lit up in a way the flashlight never could, not even the sun could.

As a teacher, he was happy she understood, but as a father, he was a bit saddened that he had stolen some magic from her.

“Are the stars satellites too?”

“No, those are suns. Some of them are much, much bigger than the sun.”

“How come they aren’t as bright?”

“Because they’re very, very far away. You know how the lights of the city look small and get bigger as we drive closer?”

“Oh.”

“If they’re suns too, are there people closer to them, like we are to the sun?”

“There are so many stars that there must be other people around some of them. There are more stars than there are blades of grass on all of the earth.”

He pulled a blade of grass from the ground, “If I just pull one blade of grass from the ground, there may be a bug on it, but probably not.” He showed her the blade, free of any life, then pulled up a handful of grass. A firefly that had been hiding in the clump was startled, lit up and flew away, “But if I pull up a whole bunch of grass, then I probably will get a bug.”

“Oh. Who put the stars and people there?”

His brain seized. There was no way he was going to try to explain even his own limited understanding of astrophysics to a five year old. That isn’t what she was asking anyway. He contemplated telling her some crap about God or Nyx and the golden egg but decided the truth was always best, “Nobody really knows.”

“Oh,” she replied, with some disappointment.

“But you can believe whatever you want about that and it’s as real as anything else.”

Lauren concentrated on the sky. He could see the gears churning in her head. Several minutes passed with nothing but the sound of crickets and the occasional buzz of some winged insect zig-zagging past them. Finally she smiled, and Leonard learned the origin of all the stars.

It seems that a little girl was at a huge pond one night with her dad. She was playing in the mud and decided to make mud-balls for the fireflies to play with. She made many many mud-balls and her father poured honey on them for the fireflies to eat. Soon, all of the mud-balls were covered with an unimaginable number of fireflies and they lit up. The fireflies tried to get away, but were stuck to the honey and the balls ended up rolling into the pond and floating in the sea of night reflected in the water.

Leonard shook away the memory, sent the ghosts away. He gazed up at the night sky. The stars dimmed and brightened like fireflies in the midnight park. He didn’t know whether it was real or the whiskey.

He held scant hope that some muddy little girl might be gazing back.

The bedroom was nearly barren, nothing but brown carpet and white walls, with a single night stand. Peepsite didn’t care as he lay in bed, settling down into the indent his large body had formed in the mattress over the years. He slipped his headphones on and they instantly filled his head with synthesizer music he’d fished out of some dollar bin at K-Mart. He smiled back at the Panasonic Girl staring at him from atop his cassette player. She was his “guardian angel”–she was the only woman, other than his mother, he really knew. She came from the cardboard backing that packaged his headphones and was as flat as his life.

It was because of a real girl, Jackie, that Peepsite had finally left school. She wasn’t the only reason, just the last straw. It was Peepsite’s sophomore year of high school. He was much bigger than all of his classmates, but that would have been true even if he hadn’t been held back. By junior high, everyone had realized it best to just leave him alone, lest they end up a bloody mess like Danny had that one fateful day in fifth grade. Peepsite generally disliked his classmates, never forgetting the treatment he’d received all through school, and was mostly happy to be left to himself.

Still, he wasn’t immune to the effects of loneliness. He was always envious of the guys he passed in the hallway, holding hands with their girlfriends, or guys getting love notes from girls in class. Sometimes he would see couples he knew from school just out at the movies having a good time, while he sat alone in the back, twitching in the flickering dark. Peepsite was a romantic, he might as well have been the Elephant Man.

He resigned himself to the fact he would be alone forever, unable to see a way anyone would change their attitude toward him. Thirteen years of school had conditioned everyone’s attitude toward him. But he always held out hope when a new girl came to town.

Jackie’s father was in the ARMY and she had lived all over the place–some places Peepsite had only dreamt of, others he’d never even heard of. She was a cute, thin girl with curly, mid-length blonde hair, large blue eyes, a constant aura of strawberry scent and a body that made good use of all three dimensions. Peepsite first saw her in history class. He was alone in the room and heard someone come in. When he turned to see who it was, she was sitting down on the other side of the room. She looked up and held his gaze for a moment and smiled, “Hi!”

“Hi,” Peepsite said quietly, as his face contorted.

She smiled, but didn’t laugh.

Peepsite grinned and nodded. He felt his face turning red, heating up. A conversation had never before started that well for him and he didn’t know what to do next. He turned and looked down at his notebook until Mr. Pearson arrived and started class.

As it turned out, they had a few classes together. Though, Jackie had made friends with several other girls, she never treated Peepsite as badly as they did. Peepsite took this to mean she liked him, not just liked him, but liked him. He dreamed of sitting with her at the movies, holding hands, smiling. Or they would go to McDonalds and sit alone in a booth, their surroundings melting away around them–all that would exist would be him and her and nothing would be able to tear them apart.

One afternoon, Jackie asked him if he was going to the upcoming dance.

Peepsite remembered the last dance he’d been to. He had just stood there awkwardly, as though some sort of invisible shield made it impossible for anyone to come within twenty feet.

“No,” he replied.

After dinner, he laid in bed cursing himself for not going. She was asking me to the dance! He thought, electronic Bach playing loudly on his cassette deck. Jackie consumed his mind as the hour grew late. He thought of her at home, laying in bed thinking of him at that same moment. What would he say to her tomorrow? He planned and re-planned, taking Jackie with him into his dreams, only to be interrupted by a pounding on the door, “Peepsite, turn that damn noise down! Some of us have to work around here!”

Peepsite walked the hallway to his locker the next morning, smiling brightly.

Some of the other kids looked at him curiously. Others even greeted him. A group of Jackie’s friends passed him, giggling. For once, he didn’t think they were laughing at him. For once, he was wrong.

A few moments later, Jackie passed him in the hallway, holding hands with one of the football players. She didn’t even notice Peepsite, as she giggled and chatted with her new boyfriend. The world seemed to darken a bit. Peepsite trudged through the rest of the day and was relieved when the final hour arrived.

He sat in his usual place, across from Jackie, in art class.

“You’re awfully quiet today,” she grinned.

“Oh.”

“Is it because of Jeff?” her grin widened.

Peepsite’s muscles tightened. His face contorted.

Jackie laughed, “You are so weird! Why do you do that?”

Peepsite raised an enormous pale fist and brought it down on the drawing table. The room instantly became silent and Peepsite rushed out to the hallway. A group of seniors, all wearing gym clothes, were out in the hallway pushing a smaller blonde boy back and forth between them. Peepsite recognized the blonde boy, but didn’t really know him well. Everyone said he was gay.

“Why don’t you pick on someone your own size?” Peepsite boomed.

“Why don’t you mind your own business, retard?” One of the bigger boys replied.

Without a pause, Peepsite marched up to him and grabbed his shirt. He threw the senior against the lockers and drove his fist into his face, easily breaking his nose. The other kids scattered in all directions and Peepsite continued to pound on his unconscious prey until two coaches and the principal pulled him away.

Peepsite had lost all control, yelling “Fucker!” and twitching as they dragged him down the hall.

He was suspended for a month for the incident, and would probably be held back again. Peepsite decided he’d had enough, and never returned.

Lisa sat at the window, her drawing pad sitting on her lap, softly illuminated by the Hummel lamp her parents had brought back from Germany. She sketched a dandelion with her colored pencils, bright and yellow, while her sisters, nieces and nephews drowned her father in animated noise downstairs. Quiet as she was, she wouldn’t silence them for anything, it let her know there was life in the house.

The dandelion reminded her of her best friend Scott, the day they met in the park.

Scott had always been a sensitive boy. His grandparents bought him a plastic swimming pool when he was very young, before he was made to go to school. He never used it. One day, he went out to play, after several days of mostly constant rain. The pool was filled with brownish water and soaked leaves.

Scott found a stick and poked at the vegetation floating in the pool. A drowned mouse drifted out from underneath. With great urgency, he ran inside to the kitchen, to get his mother. He pulled on her dress, crying and pointing at the pool. She ran outside with him.

He pointed at the mouse.

“Oh,” She said, thinking he wanted to splash around in the water, “I don’t think you should get in the pool. That mouse might have had a disease.”

“Get it out!”

His mother still didn’t understand, “No honey, it’s dead. Stay out of the water.”

“Why did it die?”

“Things die, Scott. That’s what happens.”

He hated that answer. She was his mother. Mothers knew everything. She should be able to give him a better answer than that.

Scott never forgot about that mouse. When he would be sitting alone in the living room, sometimes he would remember it, floating in the water, never again to do the things a mouse did. Or when he strolled the playground during recess, alone because the other kids only made fun of him, he would think of that mouse, alone in the pool, never again to have friends, or be able to go home to its mother.

It was around the fourth of July, and Scott’s stepfather had bought two bags of M-80s. Not doing a very good job of hiding them from a young boy, he stuffed them inside the coffee table. Scott found them easily, but didn’t bother with them at first, preferring to help his mother in the kitchen.

One morning, watching cartoons, he noticed a popping sound outside. He peeked out the window, careful to not be seen, and watched Kevin lighting firecrackers. Kevin was one of the boys from school who would have nothing to do with him on the playground. He seemed to be enjoying himself immensely, piling plastic green soldiers on top of a firecracker and then watching as they were blown apart.

Kevin grabbed one of the bags of M-80s and a punk, lighting it on the gas stove. Outside, he threw out an M-80 and covered his ears until it exploded, echoing throughout the neighborhood. Kevin saw him standing there with the bag, “Are those yours?!”

“Yeah, want some?”

That was one of the greatest days of Scott’s life, the first any of the other boys had accepted him. By the time the afternoon had rolled around, several neighborhood boys had collected around him, some even from the high school–the ones who always rode in the back of the bus. They set off M-80s throughout the neighborhood, in drainage pipes, in bottles, under the water. Each explosion was more impressive than the last. Scott was down to ten M-80s and everyone agreed the park would be the best place to detonate them.

At the last M-80, Kevin had an idea, “Let’s get a turtle!”

Scott remained quiet. He didn’t want to say anything to ruin his acceptance. Silently, he hoped they wouldn’t find a turtle. But they did.

Scott became more desperate as they hauled the tutle to a tree.

“Come on, leave it alone!”

“Shut up! It’ll be cool!”

One of the high schoolers found a rock and took out his pocket knife.

“No!” Scott screamed, then started to cry.

The other boys laughed at him, called him a sissy as they hammered the turtle to the tree. There, it writhed for a few minutes as the older boys shoved the last M-80 into its mouth.

Scott ran, leaving the laughter behind, unable to get away from the thought that the turtle would never again be able to do the things a turtle did.

After running until his breath was gone, he stopped near a girl, small and pale, picking dandelions. She looked up at him with large, green and unjudging eyes, “Hi.”

A boom echoed somewhere in the distance.

“Those are pretty,” Scott said, choking back tears, not wanting to reveal his weakness to the girl.

“They’re for my aunt and uncle. To make wine. You can help if you want.”

Scott sat down in the patch of yellow and picked dandelions. He pulled up an old white one.

Lisa smiled, “Those are pretty, too. But I don’t think they can make wine with them. What kind of flower is that?”

“It’s a dandelion, silly. They get old and die. That’s what happens.”

Lisa was saddened by this revelation. But Scott blew on the dandelion, sending tufts of white fuzz floating away on the wind, and Lisa smiled, realizing that was what dandelions did.

Anthony lay naked in bed, stuffed between the red satin sheets like a bratwurst between two buns. The bedroom had no windows and it was black as pitch. Anthony hated it. It forced him to be alone with his thoughts. He looked at the clock, its faint glowing numbers flickering from being thrown at the wall too many times–4 am. It was a blatant smack in the face. He knew Lynda was cheating on him. He wished he knew with whom, so he could beat the shit out of him.

At some level, it seemed to him that he was possibly being irrational. But he pushed that nagging feeling away, buried it deep down in a pit of anger. That was his mother talking. He knew it, because that’s what his father taught him. His father had never made a secret of his many, many mistresses. That’s just the way it was. His mother either had to accept it as a fact of life or hit the road. She chose to stay, to raise her sons, to blind herself with a Valium habit, thankful when her husband was home, sitting in the Lazy-boy with a beer, a cigar and a Playboy.

It wasn’t really cheating to Anthony when he screwed one of his waitresses in the back room after hours. He was just being a normal guy–just like his dad. The thrill of banging some bitch he barely cared about–tonight was Doreen’s lucky turn–far surpassed anything Lynda ever did to him in that bland cave of a bedroom. As he thought about it, it occurred to him that she never did anything to him–it was always him doing it to her. That was part of the problem.

Still, she’d make a good mother and Anthony knew he would have to get her to marry him before he could really do what he wanted. That’s why he kept his affairs from her, why he rushed home and was relieved she wasn’t there, even though he knew it meant she was probably out with whatever cocksucker she was fucking. And why he jumped in the shower as fast as he could get his pink shirt, black slacks and gold necklace off to wash away the scent of stale cigarettes, beer and dried pussy juice.

He rubbed his eyes, he hated this thinking crap. He threw the covers off of him and went into the bathroom, flipping on the light so he could look in the mirror. His eyes were bloodshot, his dyed black hair tussled and his moustache moist. It never would have occurred to Anthony that framed in the mirror that way, he looked like a breathing mugshot. He always thought he looked fantastic. Besides, he’d never done anything illegal. Once, he’d gotten drunk with some friends and beat the shit out of some faggot. But he considered that a public service.

Anthony examined himself for places that might need more self tanning cream but couldn’t find any. Lynda’s cat, “Fur-fur”–white, blue-eyed and overweight–came in quietly, startling him as it rubbed against his bare legs. He reached down and stroked her gently, “I guess you want some food, Fatass?”

He opened a can of food and plopped it into a glass dish, leaving it on the kitchen floor for Fatass. He saw headlights moving across the side of the apartment building and recognized the sound of Lynda’s car.

Quickly, he shut off the kitchen light and returned to bed. The anger welled up in his chest and spread to his arms and teeth, which ground together reflexively. He wanted to confront her, to make her pay for this blatant disrespect, but he also wanted to know who she was cheating with. Maybe if she thought he was asleep, she would give some clue.

The kitchen door opened, then closed. He could hear Lynda put her purse down on the counter. Take off her jacket. Whisper something to Fatass. He closed his eyes as he heard her approach the bedroom.

She didn’t turn on the light. He could hear her take off her sandals and toss them in the direction of the dresser. She took off more clothes and sat on the bed. He could feel her close to him but kept his eyes closed, even though it was far too dark in that room for her to see anything.

He twitched reflexively when he felt her touch the side of his face. She ran her hand along his cheek, then to his hair. He remained still.

Anthony tried to detect any unusual scent. To notice anything strange as Lynda got fully into the bed and pulled the covers over her. She scooted close to him. Though not touching, he could feel her face in front of his, could feel her warm breath.

He opened his eyes and glared into the blackness. Lynda was oblivious, she could see nothing. Not his reddened eyes, not the rage that filled them, not the betrayals they hid.

Anthony could smell the perfume and cheap wine on her.

In the morning, he would beat her ass for it.

Slimmy J awoke from a dream of a time when he was a boy, sitting on the green sofa with his momma, watching the rain fall onto the city. It was the first time he remembered seeing rain and it was like magic, water falling from the sky. It was supposed to be sitting in the tub or sink, the toilet. Ever since that afternoon, he’d been fascinated with water. Walking home from school in the early spring, following rushing streams of melting snow. He liked to put bottle caps or anything else that would float in the streams and follow their path with the water.

As consciousness slowly dissolved into him like a stubborn chunk of snow overcome with water, he realized he was damp. It had probably rained overnight, and that’s what caused his dream, he thought. His eyes were still closed, glued shut by discharge. He barely had the strength to get them open. He was starving and his body ached as it consumed itself to provide the energy for him to lift his head a few inches and look around. The alley was dry, he had pissed himself in his sleep again.

He knew he needed food badly, but there was no way he could summon the strength or the will to get it. He’d been in that alley for months, crawling around like a dog crippled by a car. He may not be able to feed his body, but he could still feed his habit. Weakly, he reached into his damp pocket and retrieved his lighter and a small piece of cellophane wrapped around a small rock. He put the rock into a broken light bulb lying in front of him and paused to summon the strength to hold it to his mouth long enough to smoke it. When he finished, what was left of the muscle in his arms gave out and they fell in front of him. As the euphoria took hold of him, tears streamed from his eyes, carrying away the crusted discharge like tiny bottle caps in a snowstream.

He heard footsteps approaching from the distance. It wasn’t the crisp tap he associated with cops, cocky and purposeful. It was the slurred crunch of someone dragging the weight of life behind them like a shackled prisoner. Slimmy J tried to moisten his cracked lips, but his tongue was just as dry as they were, “Professor, that you?” He croaked.

“Mornin’ Slimmy J. How you doin?”

“Oh, jus’ fine. Jus’ fine.”

Slimmy J always said that. Leonard knew better.

“Wach’ you philsophizin’ about this mornin’ professor?”

Leonard sat down a foot or so away from Slimmy J, where he could see him without having to move his head, “Aww I don’t know. I gotta wonder about people. I think they’re all goin’ crazy.” He opened a plastic bag with cut meat in it, “I got some food here. You hungry?”

“Say, that sure is nice, professor. I’m in bad shape here though. You think you could tear that up into small bits for me?”

Leonard tore the meat with his ashen fingers and fed it to Slimmy J, keeping none for himself. When it was gone, Slimmy J raised a shaking, ebony finger and scraped a bit of meat from his chin into his mouth with a yellowed fingernail.

“I know what you mean, professor. Peoples today walkin’ around with bad feelin’. I got bad feelin’ myself. I guess that why I’m here. But ain’t none of them gonna be layin’ in the alley pissin’ theyself. They’s lucky they got peoples carin’ ’bout them. My only frien’s you an’ the rats.”

“I s’pose you’re right, Slimmy J.”

“Peoples today don’ care ’bout nothin’ but theys televisions and telephones and telewhores.”

Leonard tried to imagine what that last one could possibly be. As enticing as it sounded, he could make no sense of it. He sat quietly, watching Slimmy J as his speech trailed off and he fell asleep. His breathing was slow and shallow, his hair matted and graying. Even through the thick stench of urine, feces and wasting muscle, Leonard could detect a sickening musty sweet scent coming from the bone and sunken skin.

He recognized the smell. He recognized the appearance of a body being converted into cancer food. He watched his own mother die that way. At least she had a bed. But, like Slimmy J, she was so drugged at the end, it wouldn’t have made a difference. Sitting there a foot away from this dying man, Leonard was taken back against his will to the moment of his mother’s death. He sat on the edge of the bed next to her that warm spring day with rays of morning sunlight beaming through the open windows. The new air did nothing to remove the musty stench of cancer.

His mother had no final words of wisdom for him upon her death. She lay quietly in bed, her breathing growing increasingly laborious as if the tumors were growing in weight exponentially by the second. Each release of breath was trailed by a muffled gurgle bubbling from somewhere deep in her chest. Her eyes were open but Leonard didn’t know what they were seeing. They stared into a place that could only exist in a cloud of morphine, casting a shadow somewhere in the twilight of death.

He watched her like that for several minutes until, finally, she took half a breath and managed a subtle gasp as if startled, but too weak to respond. She completed her breath and slowly it leaked away from her soggy, inflamed lungs, taking with it her life.

Leonard wanted to cry. He knew he should… everyone else in the room was. But he couldn’t. All he could do was sit there, numb, holding his mother’s cold, limp hand and looking at her sunken face. One eye was open, the other half so. Her mouth hung open. He wanted to reach into the air and grab whatever had left her and put it back in. But even if he could have done that, it was too late. Whatever it was had floated out the open windows with her final breath mixed with the new spring air.

Leonard patted Slimmy J on the shoulder, before shuffling off to let him rest, maybe forever. A tear trickled down the side of his face into his matted beard, clearing a path through the ash of street life to reveal a streak of pale skin, white as a new snow.

Peepsite sat in the cafe sipping on his hot chocolate while watching Nikki, one of the lesbian co-owners, prepare his sandwich. Something about her reminded him of a teacher he’d had long ago–Ms. Snodgrass. The mixture of hot cocoa, incense and John Lennon singing “Across the Universe” lulled him into a trance that carried him back in time.

Ms. Snodgrass was the bane of many a fifth-grader, for as long as she had been teaching–however long that was. It was impossible to determine her age. Some of her features, like her hair style, were that of an older woman. She had no wrinkles, but her body was shaped like a wax pear left out in the sun too long. Attributes that might pique interest if they belonged to someone remotely attractive seemed as though they were haphazardly stapled onto Ms. Snodgrass to dangle and jiggle like a cow’s udder.

It was difficult for Peepsite to think of Ms. Snodgrass as a woman. And if there was anything Peepsite liked to think of, it was women. Moreso than the other fifth graders, who hadn’t been held back a couple of times. As Peepsite watched–but not listened–to her lecture like a drill sergeant, it struck him how her name so matched her person.

“Snot,” he thought, “Grass. Grass is green. Green snot.”

Peepsite examined the drill sergeant. The way her lower lip protruded made her look as though she were constantly chewing tobacco. Her thin nose slanted down, like a chute aiming for her lip. He imagined her pulling the lip out further and tapping her nose, sending more material oozing down for her to pinch between her lip and gum.

“Peepsite! Pay attention!” She yelled.

Peepsite twitched reflexively. His face contorted into the gnarled mass of nerves that had been responsible for his nickname. All the kids laughed at him.

Danny, sitting next to him, poked him in the ribs, “Why do you do that?”

Peepsite reddened. Even the nerdy misfits were superior to him. The class continued to laugh. Danny, who was in no position to make fun of anyone with a head shaped like Frankenstein’s monster, removed his black-framed glasses to wipe the tears from his eyes. Peepsite grew more frantic and the world around him blurred. He caught fragments of different classmates laughing at him. David, whose ability to outrun most anyone made him the most popular kid in class, was laughing. Susan, whose recently-emerging female attributes were the inspiration for much teasing among the boys, was laughing. Even Ms. Snodgrass was taking time out from chewing her salty cud to laugh.

But Susan hurt the most. He had long had a crush on her. Though, deep down, he knew she could never have any interest in the likes of him, she was at least kind to him. A rage ignited in his stomach and burned his chest. He wanted to hit her. How could she be so cruel? But he knew he couldn’t hit her, so he hit the next best thing. He grabbed Danny by the neck and threw him backward onto his desk, raised his fist and plunged it into that misshapen Frankenstein head as hard as he could. Then again. And again.

The glasses broke. Danny’s nose began to spill blood. His tears of laughter turned to tears of fear and pain.

Peepsite’s surroundings had completely vanished now. All he could see was his prey lying there helpless before him. He continued pounding on that ugly head capped with short black hair until Mr. Newman came and dragged him into his office.

Mr. Newman’s pale, pudgy, acne-scarred face scowled at Peepsite, “You stand there with your arms raised. Out to the sides. You stay like that until I get back!”

Peepsite twitched, causing his body to contort and his hands to flap.

“You just bought yourself another half hour that way, mister.” Mr. Newman glared at him as he left the office, leaving a waft of cologne that reminded Peepsite of some candy cane candles his mother dredged out of the closet every Christmas.

It seemed like an eternity elapsed before Mr. Newman returned. Peepsite’s rather large arms were beginning to tingle and feel numb.

“You can put your arms down,” Mr. Newmann growled.

Peepsite let his arms drop. The blood rushed back into them and he shook his hands until the feeling returned.

“It seems like we go through this every week. Are you ready to tell me why you insist on being such a distraction?”

Peepsite thought hard. He was always getting in trouble and he didn’t know why. Two years ago, in the fourth grade, he had gotten in trouble badly for “making faces” at the photographer when his school photo was taken. It was really just a twitch and the resulting photo gave birth to his nickname, used even by his parents. Last year, his first in Ms. Snodgrass’ class, he was sent to the office for “playing with himself.” He didn’t even know what that meant and, instinctively, knew not to ask. He didn’t like beating Danny to a pulp. But it seemed everyone–classmates, faculty and even family–were constantly yelling at him for no reason he could see. His explosion was the result of thirteen years of pressure cooking in his gut. Perhaps with a dash of hormones thrown in for good measure.

Peepsite shrugged and let his shoulders slump under the weight of defeat.

Mr. Newmann waited as the bell rang and sighed, “Okay. Go to lunch. I’ll be sending a note to your parents and thinking of what we’re going to do with you.”

Peepsite shuffled out of the office, his head lowered. He went back to class, pushing against the tide of students flowing out of the room. He took his brown paper lunch bag from the closet and carried it to the lunch room. Peepsite found a relatively empty table and sat down at the end of it, alone. He opened the bag, and removed the contents: a bologna and peanut butter sandwich cooked in the microwave, a block of mozzarella cheese, an apple, some Little Debbie snack cakes and a diet Coke.

He stared at his lunch bag while he ate. He had been excited to bring it to school. It was a paper bag in which his dad had brought home some whiskey. Peepsite drew a stick figure of a man performing a kung fu kick in front of a large sun and a desert landscape. Above the picture were the words “Kung Fu.”

Peepsite had envied David’s lunch box all year. It was a fancy tin box with scenes from the “Kung Fu” television series. Peepsite had never been interested in the show until he saw David with the lunchbox. After that, Peepsite watched the show religiously every Friday night. It was another reason to look forward to Fridays, as if the two-day reprieve from school weren’t enough.

Peepsite hoped his lunch bag might make people like him. Everyone liked David and he had a “Kung Fu” lunch box. Maybe people would like Peepsite if he had one. Maybe they would be even more impressed with the fact that he made it himself.

Two girls scooted toward Peepsite from the end of the lunch table–one with long, curly blonde hair and the other with long straight brown hair.

The blonde giggled and pointed, “What’s that on your bag?”

Peepsite’s eyes lit up. Girls never talked to him at lunch! It looked like the “Kung Fu” drawing might be working! “It’s Kung Fu. You know, ‘Glasshoppa’.”

The girls looked at each other and laughed. It was the same sort of laugh he had just dealt with in class.

“That is so stupid!” The brunette said.

“You are so weird!” The blonde pointed out.

The two girls scooted back to the other end of the lunch table. Peepsite reddened and turned back to resume his stare at the lunch bag.

The knot of anger started to reform in his gut, stronger than before. Peepsite jumped from his seat. Everyone in the lunchroom watched quietly.

“I know Kung Fu!” Peepsite yelled, mostly unaware of his own actions.

He put his fists up in front of his face, more like a boxer than a martial arts expert, and lifted his right leg. He stood there a moment, seemingly in a trance, until a wave of nerves orchestrated to send a large spasm pulsing through his body. He shook his foot, which was still lifted in the air, contorted his head with drool streaming from his exposed and dangling tongue and then tried to shake the foot upon which he was standing.

Peepsite tumbled over onto the floor, flailing like a turtle turned upside down.

The lunchroom erupted in laughter and the brunette shook her head, “Why do you do that?”

The memory dampened Peepsite’s spirits somewhat. School had always been like that for him and that’s why he got out as soon as he could. Things got better then. A teacher from the high school lived across the street and was always kind to Peepsite. He kept a garden behind his house and when Peepsite was younger, he’d find a large, fresh watermelon sitting on his doorstep every few weeks. Later, after he quit going to school, Mr. Webb tutored him enough that he was able to get his G.E.D.

Peepsite was saddened when Mr. Webb left, though he understood why he had to–a fire had burned down his house, killing his wife and two young daughters. Of course, he knew Mr. Webb could never be the same. He had lost the characteristic sparkle in his eye, probably forever.

“There ya go!” Nikki smiled as she set the sandwich down in front of him.

Peepsite’s face clenched as he snapped back to the real world, “Thanks, Nikki.”

He took another sip of chocolate, the whipped cream having dissolved with his memories.

Frankie Ancona shifted his weight onto his good leg. It was more tiring, but less painful and Frankie was determined never to take any sort of pills. They made him lose his edge, and an Italian can’t afford to lose his edge. That was even more important than a leg. He lit up a Lucky Strike and inhaled deeply, holding the smoke in his lungs, hoping it would absorb his worries and carry them away when he exhaled.

It didn’t work. A wraith of smoke drifted away, taking nothing with it but a few soft glimmers of moonlight. But Frankie wasn’t disappointed–it had never worked. He looked at the cigarette, its tip glowing orange in the night, just a few inches from his fingers. That did calm him. He’d seen what that orange glow could do to a man–a man held in place by a couple of other guys. Now, he was playing with it, in full control. With the flick of a finger, it would be suffocated by the puddle of dog piss ten feet away.

It seemed to be the only thing he had control of. In a half hour, he’d be at home waiting for dinner with the kids and grandkids. Everyone would be screaming as if they were blocks away from each other. The children would be howling with glee as they chased each other around the house. None of them would have any idea of the burden he carried–the burden he carried for them. And it took more and more energy to keep up that wall. If it wasn’t for his eldest daughter, Lisa, he didn’t know if he could do it at all.

His throat tightened as acid bubbled up from his stomach. Shaking, he took a roll of extra strength Tums from his pocket, peeled away the wrapper and popped four discs into his mouth. He rubbed his chest as he chewed, “That was a bad one.”

Lisa had been born prematurely, tiny, weak and blue. Frankie had never experienced fear like he had that early morning when she was born, not even when he lost his leg. The instant he saw her, her life meant more to him than anything–even his edge. The nurses whisked her away. She was silent and her arms and legs moved slowly.

More nurses herded him off to a waiting room where he waited anxiously, eating Tums every five minutes. A doctor came in to assure him everything was alright. But Frankie knew death when he saw it. It was a constant battle, and life never seemed to go back to normal after that. Though she was still tiny, weak and quiet, Lisa did survive. And she was smart–the smartest person Frankie had ever known–though emotionally, she was still a child. She had never married and remained at home, usually sitting quietly alone in her room, drawing, whispering to the cat or writing in her diary.

It was Lisa Frankie was thinking of when he took out the loan, though Sammy called it an “advance” at the time. In any event, it hadn’t seemed like a big deal to him. He knew business would have to pick up again, eventually. He just needed some cash to get by and Sammy had always been close to the family.

It had been a year now and Sammy was getting impatient. Tonight was his strongest threat yet: “You know if it wasn’t for your aunt, you’d be bleeding right now?” sent via one of Sammy’s boys–Frankie didn’t know which, he couldn’t keep track of them all. He wished he had some sons, but somehow only ended up with four daughters and involving their husbands would be involving them.

The stories about Frankie’s aunt and Sammy had been rehashed around the dinner table for years. The old woman had always been a bit off-balance, giving the girls her used stockings or makeup for Christmas gifts. One year she had wrapped up her toaster and gave it to Lisa for Christmas.She had been married to Frankie’s uncle longer than Frankie’s own parents had been married. Then one day he disappeared, never to be found. It was then she started spending all of her time with Sammy, neglecting family functions completely until she was mysteriously committed to a mental hospital and forgotten by everyone. Except as the subject of much speculation.

Whatever her shortcomings, the old woman seemed to be the only reason Frankie was safe for the moment. He wondered if she was still alive.
Frankie was snapped out of his daydream when his Lucky Strike bit him. He flicked it vengefully, with perfect aim, ten feet away and smiled at the satisfying sigh it gave as it was extinguished.

Taking a deep breath to prepare himself for the evening at home, Frankie returned to the shop to close up. He untied the bloody rags from his waist and threw them in a large black trash bag. The blood-stained knives went in the dishwasher and he grabbed his coat, hat and the full trash bag. Limping toward the front door, he snapped his free fingers. He’d forgotten something. It was more of an effort for Frankie than it would be for most. He dropped the bag and limped back into the cutting room. He took a package of meat wrapped in a plastic bag and went out the back door again. The remnants of the Lucky Strike partially floated in its puddle like a body bobbing up in the river.

Frankie closed the top of the trash dumpster and left the package of meat sitting atop. He went back to the door and paused, propping himself against the frame with his shoulder. He fished out another couple of Tums and chewed them up, rubbing his chest.

“Gotta stop sneaking bites of pepperoni,” he scolded himself.

He limped back inside to the laundry bag and shut off the lights and locked the door behind him. The red neon of the “Closed” sign tinted the moist pavement of Broadway. The cement was sweating, it was so hot. He turned to gaze into the darkened deli, letting the emptiness absorb into himself. Then he headed home to Lisa, who would be waiting by the window in her darkened room upstairs.

Leonard shuffled down the red brick sidewalk, leaving a trail of loneliness, defeat and body odor behind him. The air was soggy and warming up fast. It would be another hot day. It was far better than the freezing cold, but why did spring and fall have to be so short? It seemed to Leonard that the extremes were far more common. And if anyone would know, it was Leonard. He’d been living on the streets for… some years… he’d lost track of how many.

He rubbed his eyes and paused for a few seconds to let the blur fade away. Then the most important thought of each new day: Where am I going to get the money for a bottle? I just need a half-pint to start. He felt deep into his pockets and scooped up everything that his fingers could find–mostly bits of paper and gravel. Thirty-seven cents in change. It was a start.

As his focus sharpened, Leonard found himself looking at the Catholic Church across the street. It was a large, old building constructed of white stone with a big, sloping red roof. There was a marble statue of an angel in front, bathed in spotlights that were hidden by plants around its base. The building always seemed inviting, which is why he slept close to it. He felt safe with it near. A group of happy, well-dressed people–mostly couples–came out of the large, arching front doors. They were the same people who whispered about him as they passed on the sidewalks. Saddened, Leonard continued on his way.

An attractive, younger woman was coming out of Starbucks with a coffee in one hand and holding a cellphone to her ear with the other. Leonard paused to avoid a collision, as the woman showed no signs of slowing down herself. Though she was looking ahead, her eyes seemed vacant as she spoke into the phone. She didn’t seem the slightest bit aware of his presence.

“That son-of-a-bitch is gonna find himself in a lot of trouble if he pulls that shit with me!” She told the pink plastic box. Leonard watched as she tromped across the street without looking for traffic. Miraculously, she avoided any cars, almost as if the statue across the street had planned it that way. Leonard shook his head and continued down the sidewalk.

Further on, there was a woman standing in front of a building smoking a cigarette. The cigarette looked inviting, unlike the mottled lips from which it dangled. As he approached, the woman glanced at him nervously. He walked up a few steps and stood across from her in the entranceway, “Think I could bum one of them from you?” He nodded at the cigarette dangling from her mouth.
The woman eyed him momentarily, “Sure.” Shaking, she dug a cigarette from her pack and handed it to him.

“Can I use your lighter?” There was a hint of shame in his tone. He had nothing but the clothes disintegrating from his body and the ancient memories disintegrating from his mind.

“So, they pretty good about opening up at 8:30?” The woman asked, revealing a mouth devoid of all but a single, rotten upper tooth barely embedded in spongy, red gum.

Leonard nodded, not out of any particular knowledge, but out of a desire to be agreeable. It was his way of showing gratitude for the cigarette. Gratitude for even acknowledging his existence.

“Good. I gotta be at work at 9am sharp. I ain’t gonna lose my job because the judge discriminated me.”

“Discriminated?”

“He said he knew I was a meth-head because of my teeth. I can’t afford to get ‘em fixed. I don’t do no meth. I got kids. I got busted with marijuana.”

Leonard nodded, still not sure what she was on about.

“I did all my community service. Paid my fines. Then that lady said she knew

I was doin’ meth. I thought they wasn’t supposed to discriminate. I got a hundred dollars to give my lawyer. I’m gonna see about suin’ them.”

“What lady’s that?”

“That lady runs this place, I guess. I ain’t done meth in… years. I got kids. I got a job.”

Leonard nodded agreeably. The scabs on her face stuck out like Pinocchio’s nose. Her blonde hair was as dirty as his, but not as long.

“What you here for?”

Leonard looked around, then noticed the words “Midtown Correctional Services” on the door.

“Oh, I was just passin’ through on my way to the store.”
“I understand if you don’t want to say. Hell, my sister’s my supervisor at work.

Otherwise, I’d be in big trouble.”

Leonard groped deep through the slush of his mind, trying to reach that person he used to be–the one who rarely ever drank alcohol. But he couldn’t find him. He wondered if that person would be able to make any sense at all of this conversation.

He was thankful for the sound of metal against metal that caught the woman’s attention. Then a click, then an older, normal-looking woman opened the tinted glass door. She glanced at Leonard disapprovingly. Maybe she’s the discriminator. The blond meth-head flicked her cigarette away and silently walked inside. Leonard decided to move on, worried that he might be the next to be discriminated.

Another stop at the intersection, waiting for the machine to tell him it was okay to continue. He sucked the last bits of life from his cigarette until it burned his lips, then tossed the butt to the ground. A dark-complected man, wearing mirrored sunglasses and a gold necklace, pulled up in a red sports car. Leonard watched as the man looked over at him, then rummaged for something. The man waved a bill out the window, “Hey you! Clean my windshield!”
Leonard looked around.

“Yeah you!”

Hesitantly, Leonard approached the sports car. He eyed the bill–it was a ten, “Pardon?”

“Clean my windshield and I’ll give this to you.”

“I don’t have a towel or nothin’.”

Leonard took off his tattered jacket, but the man grabbed his arm before he could begin wiping, “Don’t use your filthy coat! Here!” He handed Leonard a silky white handkerchief from his own coat pocket. Leonard began wiping, afraid he would do more harm to the spotless window than good.

The man pointed to a spot, “Just clean up that bug there,” he demanded, impatiently.

Leonard rubbed down the spot thoroughly.

“That’s fine, here.” He handed Leonard the ten dollar bill but pushed away his hand when he tried to return the handkerchief.

“Keep it,” he said, shaking his head as he sped off.

Leonard was too excited to be humiliated. He’d be able to get a whole pint of whiskey now! With a renewed vigor, he headed for Berbiglia, only to be slowed by a sound in the distance. The sound of a barking dog. He’d heard plenty of dogs around town in the… however many… years he’d been on the streets. But something about the way it echoed managed to reach that place in his mind below the sludge and haze. A part of him that existed in a time he had long buried. A time when he had a dog and parents.

The memory fluttered in his head like the first impatient kicks of a fetus inside its mother. Leonard pushed it back down deep, replacing the void it left with the warm comfort in knowing Berbiglia was only a block away.