Marisa Crane

Three Things



First of all, I don’t remember it the way it really happened.

The human brain is the most unreliable invention since the oven, and I’ve been burning my bacon for far too long (but probably not as long as I think).

Surely you know that our minds can’t remember every detail of every encounter? That’s why they fill in the blanks with false memories and wishful thinking. To complete the picture. And don’t even think about prompting me for more details than I can give you, man.

Yeah, I know it’s your job to write a complete account of the incident, but if you keep pushing me, you’ll wind up with some twisted, bastard child of the truth that my imagination spits up. And chances are, that’s not what you’re after.

Oh, you know this must be really hard for me? Do you really?

Ohhhhhhhh, you know what it’s like to lose someone too? Please, keep trying to relate to me using half-hearted lines they taught you in the FBI or CIA or wherever it is you came from.

The FBI? Agent...?

McDonald. Right. Well, Agent McDonald, I don’t need your buddy-buddy bullshit.

Alright, so I am a bit testy. What do you expect from me? I still see blood when I close my eyes.

You want to know what I remember leading up to the incident? Well, back up just a second. What I was getting at earlier is, you can be an unreliable eyewitness of your own destruction. You just need some outside suggestion to connect the wrong dots.

That’s one of three things that I do know for sure.

How do I know? I majored in psychology before dropping out. I know a thing or two about the brain and human behavior. Enough to know that loving him wasn’t a choice regardless of what the Christians say.

What’s the second? Oh, well, that’s a bit more complicated. Why don’t you get us some more coffee and cigarettes before we continue?

We can’t continue what we haven’t begun? I guess I’ve got a smart one on my hands, after all.

______

Suppose I’m a masochIst or a romantIc. Suppose I’m both.

Suppose I want to talk about him in hopes that he won’t disappear completely.

Is this relevant? Of course it is. Now, do you want to hear about it or not?

It was the beginning of my sophomore year at State and Mickey was fucking some girl that lived down the hall from me. It was a co-ed dorm and most of the students seemed really excited to increase their chances of getting laid just by walking to the bathroom in a towel.

She was chubby, bordering on fat, but if it’s on the record, I’ll just say she was chubby. Oh, you don’t need that for the record? Okay, then she was pretty damn fat. She had dark brown ringlets down to her shoulders and from what Mickey once told me, she always matched her bra and underwear. I’ve been told this is desirable. I never got close enough to see the color of her eyes but I think they were light. She spent a lot of time in the bathroom contouring her face to make it look thinner. I know this because the girls on my floor loved to gossip during our Thursday night beer pong games.

The first time I saw Mickey, he punched out the glass of a fire extinguisher. I’d just been getting home from a party on the other side of campus when he burst out of the fat girl’s room, arms flailing and jaw flexed. He had broad shoulders and was an inch or two taller than me, which wasn’t saying much. He looked like he could beat me in an arm wrestling competition then drink me under the table. His head was buzzed so close that it was nearly shaved, but I could tell his hair would be black if he grew it out.

What are you doing? she squealed in the doorway.

He yelled FUCK then glanced around quickly and broke the glass with his fist.

What do you mean can I skip ahead to the night of the incident? Don’t you have any idea that the what isn’t nearly as important as the why? And there is no why without a background story.

I can continue? Thanks a bunch.

Like I said, he punched the glass case that was holding the fire extinguisher, only, there was no fire. I think it was just the first breakable thing he saw except me.

Fast forward to the second time I saw him. His hand was bandaged up and his eyes looked sad. He was sitting in the courtyard smoking a cigarette. I could tell it was him from be- hind, because of the way his ears sort of stuck out. Not enough to be called a monkey by teasing brothers but just enough to notice.

Am I smiling like a fucking goon?

Anyway, as I approached him, I could see a tiny box sitting in his lap. Maybe three or four inches long. I couldn’t tell what was inside of it until I was right beside him.

A June bug. A dead one. Can you believe it? His shell was a brilliant green, the kind that made you wish autumn would never come. He looked so damn innocent lying in that homemade coffin, like he’d lived a humble and hard-working life but never really knew love.

I think I fell in love with him in that very moment. Mick, of course. Not the June bug. Tough guy, my ass.

I asked if I could sit with him and he kind of just nodded absent-mindedly. I lit a cigarette and we looked at the little guy in silence.

I’m gay too, ya know? he said after a while.

What? I asked, breathlessly.

I just, ya know, heard some things about you. Plus, I saw a guy sneak out of your room at the ass crack of dawn the other day. He smirked as he said it.

Oh, uh, him, he’s not anybody...

As you can imagine, I was shaking. I mean, I couldn’t even steady my hand enough to take a decent drag. Trying to distract myself, I surveyed the courtyard. Two guys were throwing a football. A group of girls in short skirts and sun dresses were passing a flask around, all laughing like someone had just told the most magnificent joke in the world. A plane left an illustrious trail in the sky behind it.

I looked back at him and the sun shot beams of light across his autumn eyes.

______

See, I told you we’d need coffee and cigarettes. You still don’t see how any of this relates? Do you have somewhere to be or do you want to know how Mickey ended up with three bullets in his back? For fuck’s sake, man.

All right, all right, I’ll keep my voice down. You don’t need to send the goon squad on me. Keep your distance, boys. Oh, and hold the cream. Where I come from we drink shit coffee and we drink it black. Laugh all you want, you don’t need to understand my family.

So get this, we were sitting there in the courtyard and I was convinced he was made of glass. I was so afraid to touch him that I could feel my body leaning away from him even though all I wanted was to find out what happens when anticipation gives way to temptation. He smirked at me because he knew. In retrospect, I don’t know if he knew that I was completely and irrevocably in love with him or just that I was awkward and unwilling to make the first move.

He glanced at his watch, said he was late for class, and abruptly stood up, clearing his throat and wiping off the butt of his jeans.

A week later we had our first kiss in a bathroom stall. A month later we stopped hiding our relationship. Three months later we got our own apartment together.

Six months later we dropped out. It goes that way sometimes.

Why did we drop out? I think you know the answer to that. Oh, now you want me to back up? To when? To the day we met Papa? Okay, if you insist.

Mickey and I were at an amusement park close by. He’d just aced some philosophy exam he’d been all worried about and we decided to celebrate. Growing up on the south side my family had never had the money to go to theme parks or anything, but I’d saved a bit of money tutoring at the student center. We snuck a flask into the park and soon regretted it, half-laughing as we were keeled over next to the Superman rollercoaster. Wiping our mouths, we ran from the scene of the crime and got in line to get some soda.

That’s where we saw Papa. He was alone and euphoric. All 6 feet, 4 inches of him. He was tall and thin with broad shoulders. His arms were way too long for his body, ya know, he probably could have tied his shoes without bending over if he wanted. Okay, maybe that’s an exaggeration, but you get the idea. His hands were boulders at the end of his string bean arms. It wasn’t until later that I saw the demolition they could cause. He was maybe in his early forties with salt and pepper hair.

Hey boys, he said, all jolly and sun burnt.

Uh hi, we both mumbled.

You don’t reckon ya’ll have some sun screen, do ya? His southern twang became evident with each additional syllable. No, sorry. I looked at Mickey and then at the ground.

It’s okay, won’t hold it against ya. You boys seem like nice young men. What brought y’all here today? He asked it as if riding rides was the last reason to be there.

We’re celebrating, Mick said.

Celebratin’ what, might I ask?

Being geniuses, he laughed.

Well, that’s a damn good reason to celebrate if I ever heard one, Papa smiled. Or maybe he didn’t say anything at all. I just remember that gold tooth nearly blinding us.

We smiled back politely and he asked what year we were and where we went to school. We answered him then turned to talk to each other, thinking the conversation with Papa was over, but the conversation with Papa is never really over, now is it? Where is he anyway? Do you have him in holding here? Or is he in maximum security? Oh c’mon, you can tell little old me. I’m not gonna do anything, I swear. You don’t believe me? Hmph, I guess I wouldn’t believe me either.

Let me ask you this, have you ever felt like you don’t belong anywhere? Like you’ve searched up and down, inside and out, for a place that makes sense with you in it? And I’m not talking about that hormonal, angsty, teenage shit either. It’s so much deeper than that. It’s as if I’m a toy some kid once took meticulous care of then misplaced and never bothered to search for again. I mean, shit, I’ve spent 22 years holding onto the handle bars of this whirling, nauseous ride we call life and I still haven’t gotten used to the revolutions. Papa created a world within this world. A world for the rejected.

Do you think I’m blind? I can see you rolling your eyes to Officer So-and-So over there. Or do you just not care because I’m on this side of the table and you’re on that side? I guess they’ll let just anybody join law enforcement these days, eh? Good luck getting the rest of the story, man.

______

Okay, suppose I was bluffing. Suppose I keep telling you how it all went down. I’d like a few more cigarettes and some humanity before I do. I think that’s the least I can ask for.

Thank you. I see you do have a soul underneath that hardened exterior.

Let’s talk about you for a second, McDonald. Do you have a family?

Crickets, huh? How do you expect me to sit here and tell you all about myself as if I were a Catholic at his first confession in 20 years, if you won’t even tell me more than your name?

This is like pulling teeth, man. I’ll wait all night. I’ll even skip my evening appointment to do Sudoku with my cell mate. Yeah, I know, wild stuff.

Okay, so you’ve got a wife and three kids? That’s a start. Do you treat them well?

What do you mean what kind of question is that? It might be one of the only questions worth asking.

So you treat them well, whatever well is. You love them, I take it?

In your own way? That’s an interesting answer. Papa says that it’s only love if it won’t answer to any other name.

Sure I believe him. Why wouldn’t I? He’s a brilliant man.

He saved my life, he really did. Mick too, before that fucking pig shot him down. And believe me when I tell you, my love for Mickey could go by no other name. Yet the majority of people out there don’t think that we should be able even be together, let alone get married. They don’t see our love as valid.

And that’s why Papa and the rest of our family had to make them see it.

Slow down? Am I talking too fast? I don’t feel like I am. Shit, Mick would tell me that sometimes when we first joined Papa, would say that I have so many ideas swirling around in my head. I can remember I would smile, put my hands on my hips and stick my chest out like Superman, then say that I was going to do magnificent things in this world, that he would be a part of them. We felt like we were on top of the world, truly. I mean, at least I did. I guess I can’t speak for Mick but he seemed pretty excited and all. I swear, we were going to change the world. Harvey Milk was going to jerk off in his grave. It was going to be monumental.

______

Good morning, Agent McDonald! I hope you had a good night. Played games with the kids. Made sweet, sweet love to your wife and fell asleep into a deep slumber. Had eggs, toast, and bacon for breakfast, saw the kids off to school, and gave your wife a big ol’ kiss on the lips before heading to work.

Am I close? Haha! I can see you trying to hide your smile behind your coffee. Speaking of which, can I get a cup too? The roommate kept me up all night sharing his romantic woes with me.

You know, the corners of your mouth twitch the same way Mickey’s used to when he was trying not to smile. He’d try to preserve this mock serious face while doing something entirely outrageous then look at me for a reaction. Once I’d laugh or say something I thought was witty, he’d break into an amused smile like he’d just won a comedy competition he hadn’t even entered.

God, that boy could do things to me. He could somehow convince me to read him entire novels out loud. We used to spend sunny days sharing a hammock in the backyard of Papa’s house, watching the german shepherd pup, Hank, chase the chickens between chapters of whatever book I was reading him at the time. He loved The Sun Also Rises when he could figure out who was saying what. Hemingway had a nasty habit of letting the conversation go on too long without any clarification of who was speaking, which was fine for the reader but not the listener. I started having to use a different voice for each character just so he could follow their deprivation properly.

He liked the simple sentences Hemingway used, not because he was simple, but precisely because he wasn’t. He didn’t see any purpose in including superfluous descriptions when one sentence could convey crippling heartache if done well. You know the one sentence I would tell him now?

The wrong man died that day.

That’s the second thing that I do know for sure. That the wrong man died.

Why do I say that? Shit, because he was a better man than I’ll ever be. He changed me and he could have changed others too, if only he’d had more time. Papa loved him dearly, like a son.

Did I ever feel pressured into joining Papa’s cult? Ugh, I hate when you use that word, cult. It sounds so... creepy. That word is reserved for groups like the Scientologists and Heaven’s Gate. What would I call us then? I don’t know, we were a family, we really were, but I hesitate to use that word because of that sonofabitch Manson. He shitted all over that word and contorted it until it was synonymous with cruelty.

I guess we were a clan, or a tribe, if I were forced to choose a term. Living together in that home out in the country with the 15 or so other guys and Papa was intoxicating. On the warm nights, Mick and I and a few others would sleep out back under the stars. Naked and bursting with plans. I’d never known such a genuine camaraderie.

Answer the question? What was it again? Oh, that’s right. I can’t stress enough that Papa never even asked us to join.

He just knew we would. Therein lies the third thing that I do know for sure. He never coerced me, Mick, or anyone else for that matter. He’s a sweet, gentle guy who is after what we’re all after.

And what’s that? Liberation. I bet you want liberation from that monotonous life you return home to each night, don’t ya? You don’t have to answer the question. I know that it’s at least partially true. The marriage, the mortgage, the once-every-six-months sex, bills, etc. But you, you have something we don’t have. You can walk down the street holding your wife’s hand and no one will bat an eyelash, let alone jump you. Now, I’m not asking for your pity. I’m only trying to get you to understand.

So what happened after we met Papa at the amusement park, you ask? Well, a few weeks later, Mick and I were sitting in our math class with our hoods up and sweatpants on, half-asleep and hungover from Sunday Funday. It was a huge class—I’d say 200 or so—ya know, one of those core classes everybody had to take, so it didn’t matter much what we did.

The professor was late so a steady buzz of chatter filled the lecture hall. I think I started to doze off, because the next thing I knew, Mick was elbowing me in the ribs and pointing towards the front of the room.

What did you do that for? I grumbled, still not fully conscious. He leaned over and asked me if that was the weird guy we saw at the theme park a little while back. The one with the southern accent and dark hair, speckled with gray. I followed his hand and there was Papa, wearing a serious look, teeth set. From the waist up he looked normal donning a blue dress shirt and striped tie, but on the bottom half was a pink tutu. You know what a tutu is right? Oh, your daughter wore one for her dance recital? How precious.

So there he was, acting as if he had no idea he was wearing a tutu. He introduced himself as the substitute professor and wrote his name on the board as Professor Milk. Mick and I chuckled, understanding the reference.

This guy’s gotta be gay, right? I whispered to Mick. For sure, he said, nodding and smirking at me.

Then Papa wrote something else on the board. Once he finished, he capped the marker and slammed it down so hard on the whiteboard ledge that the sound echoed throughout the lecture hall. He stood with one hand on his hip and scanned the classroom slowly. I can remember being nervous as hell as his eyes got to me. I felt as if he could see through me. I tried to concentrate on what the board said, what it meant.

He had written, “Man is condemned to be free. -Sartre.”

A stuck-up, blonde girl in the front raised her hand and before Papa could call on her, she shouted out that this was a math class and not a philosophy class. He smiled condescendingly at her. I loved that he did that. I imagine she raised her eyebrows or something as if to say what? And you know what he said? He said you must first think about thinking before you can think properly about anything else.

I’m sorry, I couldn’t hear you. What did you say? Oh, do I think Papa knew we’d be in that class? Honestly, I don’t know, but I’d like to think yes. I’d like to think that he sought us out after meeting us, that he found his way to us. Papa has a funny way of doing that: finding something he’s looking for. He used to lose his favorite jean jacket—covered in patches from classic rock bands—all the time, yet he’d always find it in strange places. Once it was in the chicken coop. Don’t know how the hell it got there.

He spent the rest of that fifty-minute class charming Mickey and I, whether it was intentional or not. Papa has this charismatic air about him—like a combination of Winston Churchill and Martin Luther King Jr. There wasn’t anything he could say that I didn’t immediately support and agree with. He walked around the front of the lecture hall as if he’d been up there a million times, as if he wasn’t wearing a tutu. As if he hadn’t snuck into our academic building and began to teach a class under false pretenses. None of that mattered, because once he shut up the snobby girl in the front, everyone was still.

Man is condemned to be free, he began. What does that mean to all of you? Why did Sartre use the word “condemned,” which seems to imply that freedom is punishment? I think it’s because he knows that almost more than anything, we hate responsibility and accountability. With free will, we can’t blame ideas like fate or destiny for our mishaps. We can only blame ourselves, and that’s a frightening thing to live with, now isn’t it? In that way, we are certainly condemned. But if we are free to do as we please then our sentencing is no sentencing at all, yet we continue to feel trapped.

Raise your hand if any of you have ever felt the weight of the world coming down on you. Only a couple? Close your eyes everyone, let’s do this again. Now, raise your hands. It’s quite a different story now. Open your eyes and look around. Everyone here can feel the invisible shackles around their ankles and wrists. We are imprisoned by our own decisions.

______

A week after he masqueraded as our substitute professor, Mick and I were standing nervously on Papa’s doorstep, prompting each other to ring the doorbell. He had slipped us his card on our way out of class that day, you see. You do it. No, you, do it, our eyes said. I thought my knees would buckle beneath me. Finally, I took a deep breath and pressed the bell. I pulled my pointer finger back and studied it as if it were not a part of my body. We heard a few pots and pans clang inside and the running water turn off. Papa opened the door, I think expecting to see someone else, then recognition poured over his face and he beamed. His smile was so wide I thought the sides of his mouth would touch his ears.

I was hoping you buys would come, he said. We glanced nervously at each other then both broke into a smile. A few days later we dropped out of State and moved in with Papa and a bunch of other guys around our age. I didn’t call my mom to tell her I dropped out. I figured it would make her angry as hell so I continued to call her every Sunday and make up some bullshit about my psychology classes. I always loved psych so it wasn’t so hard to give her the old runaround.

For a while, we would just hang around all day listening to music and throwing back some beers while Papa filled us in on what our family was about, what our purpose was. Then he started to give us assignments. First it was just petty theft, ya know, pick-pocketing strangers in crowded, straight bars. It started as just a fuck you to the people who had spat on us and said we are going to hell. We’d kiss in front of people and wait to see who took the bait. And maybe that wasn’t nice of us, to set people up like that, but people wouldn’t need setting up if they could just treat us right.

Anyway, once Papa saw how talented we were, he asked us to do a bigger job and rob a house, and it was still a fuck you, but a bigger one. Papa said the man of the house—who was married to a woman—once followed him out of a gay bar and tied him to a pole in the dead of Michigan winter and left him there, calling him a Dirty Fag and Fruity Pebbles. The man probably doesn’t remember but Papa, well, he couldn’t forget. Mick and I snuck in the window of the procreator’s house, picked their safe and took everything in it. We even pissed on their Jesus photo hanging in the living room. That was our first home job, but certainly wasn’t our last. We went to all the rich areas: Northeast, Northwest, and the suburbs.

But eventually, robbery wasn’t enough. It’s like a drug, ya know, you build tolerance and then you need a bigger high. Plus, Papa’s vision was changing and he realized stealing from hateful straight people wasn’t sending a message. We followed the news closely. They didn’t have any suspects and just assumed the motive was money-driven. We weren’t in it for the material goods, although they were a nice perk. We needed to get our message out there.

One morning, Mick and I were drinking beers and smoking cigarettes out in the backyard when Papa limped out, two black eyes in the process of forming and a huge gash across the bridge of his nose. Blood was seeping out and he grinned a jack-o-lantern smile. Stunned, we didn’t say a word.

We’re going for blood this time, boys, Papa said.

What happened, I asked? I could hear the panic in my voice. My hands were trembling. Mick grabbed my thigh and squeezed it tight.

This goddamn diner down the street, boys. I went there with Rick. You remember Rick, right? We went to grab some breakfast, acted straight, of course, didn’t hold hands or touch or anything and we got seated at a booth right near the front. Once we were seated, Rick put his arm around me and I gave him a kiss. Nothing crazy, just a quick peck on the lips. When I looked down at my menu, a shadow appeared over it. I looked up and there was the manager, huge guy, massive arms folded, eyes squinting like we couldn’t be trusted. The vein down the center of his forehead was throbbing. He told us to get the hell out of his restaurant, that he doesn’t serve our kind of people. His voice was loud, loud enough for the rest of the people eating there to hear and turn a blind eye. No one stood up for us. Everyone just kept to themselves and ate their shit food.

We didn’t budge, though. Our asses were glued to that booth like you wouldn’t believe. I glanced through the menu quickly then looked him in the eyes and asked if I could get blueberry pancakes. I smiled like an angel, boys. I’m gonna ask you one more time then I’ll kick you out myself, he said through gritted teeth. Rick ordered a slice of apple pie, insisting that it was his favorite breakfast. Once it became clear that we weren’t going to leave, he grabbed me by the front of my shirt and lifted me out of my seat, carrying me out the door with Rick following behind. He tossed me on the ground and before I could get up, he straddled my hips and punched me in the nose. I mumbled something about his position being pretty gay and he kicked me in the mouth. Stay away from my fucking business, he said, walking back into the diner.

So what did we do? I mean, you know what happened next, McDonald. We rounded up the boys and made a plan. Grabbed our AK-47s, hopped in Papa’s truck, and drove to the diner. Mick was the one who actually killed the manager. The rest of us opened fire on anyone there. The blood was beautiful, I tell ya. I didn’t think I was going to be able to stomach it. I really surprised myself, but I guess the blood of gay oppressors isn’t really pure, now is it? It’s more like the litter you clean up on the streets left by wasteful, negligent people. The blood splattered beautifully, like a painting I could never recreate. I’m sure you’ve got plenty of pictures, though. You want me to get on with it? Okay, okay. I mean, what else is there to say?

We heard the sirens and started to run in all different directions. Mick and I chucked our guns in the bushes and ran down Market Street. We made it one block before two cop cars screeched to a halt and a few cops jumped out telling us to stop and put our hands in the air. I took another step or two and Mick, who was still running, looked back at me with hopeful eyes. Those auburn missiles, man. They never failed to paralyze me. I think that’s why I stopped, Agent. Not because of the cops, but because of him and his eyes. That’s why I’m alive. But Mick, he didn’t stop. Bang. One bullet in his kidney. It didn’t take him down though. He clutched onto his lower left back but kept on hobbling. Bang, bang. Two more bullets to his upper back. This time he fell to his knees then collapsed onto his chest. His body flopped to the ground like it had no bones. I can remember screaming so loudly it shook my skull. I think my feet started to carry me towards him. Distant voices told me to stop and keep my hands where they could see them. The words swam towards my ears, thick and distorted. I don’t remember getting handcuffed nor sitting in the back of the cop car. I don’t remember my mug shot or getting fingerprinted either. There was and is no world after Mick.

Do I regret what we did? I don’t regret killing those people, no. Maybe I regret how we went about it, maybe I regret not saving Mick, but we wanted to send a message. We wanted to show them that our love matters, because it does, it really does.

Ah shit, MacDonald. Fuck. Our efforts were pointless, weren’t they?

What good is love without someone to share it with?