It was supposed to always happen in halves. I was promised half for doing all of the typing and editing, and he was to be compensated half for writing the story. And then there was her hiding somewhere in the shadows.
We made a handshake deal to divvy up the fruits of our creative labor two ways, or better yet, in half. We then sealed the deal with simple eye contact, each aware of what we had to do, the door wide open, the path before us, with a gate at the end, and somewhere hid the muse watching, waiting to make her entrance.
I like to think I was offered half of the earnings because I had a typewriter. I’m not sure if I believe it though.
I lived in a grey stucco style shack of an in-law unit tucked away in the high desert sage just east of the Sierra Nevada and on the outskirts of the cereal bowl most folks call Lake Tahoe. And over the hills and far far away, lived her, and her children.
The writer, if that’s what we should call him, well, he lived about a couple of miles or so away in the wilderness just west of here where he says he moonlights as night security for a circus, or a zoo of some sort. I can’t remember exactly. I’ve never been to his place, as he is a bit of a recluse and only likes to visit me from time to time without even so much of a warning. So I do not consider myself at liberty to say exactly where he lives if I don’t very well know his precise whereabouts.
I was twenty-four when I made the paradisiacal pilgrimage from just over the other side of the Mason-Dixon Line to the Golden State of California—the sunny snow globe fiery paradise that it is. Knowing me, I think I was probably chasing tail. I’m forty-four now, and hell, I still can’t figure what I meant by living a life on the run like I did way back when. Which is probably why I’m still running over these hills in my mind to somewhere far far away from here and towards her.
She was one of those eternally beautiful fragile sort of women for her age though, and was still extremely sexy and most likely the object of much attention at all the local watering holes, churches, casinos, coffeeshops, flea markets, amongst the stars, supermarkets, and quite possibly, even Heaven.
Hell, let’s be real here, and just go ahead and say, absolutely everywhere she went, men most likely wanted her attention.
The writer, in case you were wondering, well, he was in his mid forties, lost in an existential crisis, balding, and always bewildered, dad bod and all, and looked as if his life choices had served him up quite the somewhat inspirational, yet confusing long-winded story, as well as, a couple two-timing women, a whole lot of drunken debauchery, many warm memories, a couple of cars, and also a truck with shit transmissions.
He felt he had to write the story because he wanted to tell folks all about something that he believed in, and because of something that happened to him over the years before in the wilderness of love. There was, apparently, another story he wanted to tell about a time when he worked for the zoo.
He also wanted to make some scratch, some dough, like I did: half of it after all.
My entrance into the whole shit show happened so quickly and came back around from an entirely different direction: One stormy, yet sunny afternoon I was out relaxing in front of my stucco shack in the driveway, smoking a cigarette, eating an apple, and balancing a typewriter on my head, all the while staring at a heartache stained sky wondering whether or not it was going to rain.
What I was doing was something of a hidden talent for me. I had become so involved with trying to find the perfect balance between the typewriter and my head, while staring into a blood stained sky, snacking on a piece of fruit from my creative labor, and slowly committing suicide via stupidity and smoking a cigarette.
You would swear yourself though, that you thought I was hired to do what I was doing while being paid an ample salary with amazing benefits, that being, if and when you saw me as I found the perfect balance staring into a heartache stained sky just as the clouds started pouring down rain.
“Hey, you!” I heard a pleasant voice yell.
I looked aways across the way, and through a reflection in a puddle I saw her. She was wearing a purple parka that I had seen her wear only once. Her eyes weren’t the same color as I thought I remembered though.
Interesting, I pondered…
When it rains heavily during drought season here in the high desert of Nevada, the water has nowhere to go, so it puddles up quickly and flash floods are most often imminent. The area around us quickly became one big puddle you had to walk through, instead of around. The two of them had traveled around on completely different frequencies for quite a few lifetimes now, but universal energy has a magnetic way of bringing certain things back together and this puddle was that magical moment.
She was wearing a pair of obnoxiously bright white galoshes that went halfway up her calf, but she made them look youthfully amazing, as the rain boots made her divine and supreme soul look a thousand years her younger. She was so fragile and was so firmly entrenched in the universe that her gorgeous figure looked to still be shaped by some eternal cosmic wind.
“What do you need?” I demanded.
“You have a typewriter, correct?” She asked back. “I went by your place earlier and saw that you were balancing a typewriter on your head today, and if I may, why and the hell do you do that by the way?”
“What’s it matter to anyone how I try and harness my creative chi?” I said with a shit-eating grin.
“But at night you type a lot,” she said reaching her arm through the puddle and taking the cigarette out of my mouth, and then taking an extended sigh from it herself before flicking it into a raging fire that just appeared out of nowhere. “I can always hear you typing away at night. Type. Type. Type. That’s all I ever hear, but you, you never get anywhere.”
“Yeah, I’ve been known to have a typewriter, what’s it to you?” I asked.
“You’re a good typist and an okay editor, from what I hear.” she said grabbing the apple from my hand through the puddle too, and taking a big ole bite out of it before handing it back to me.
“That’s a very debatable topic, but some do consider me alright in some creative arenas in some way, shape, or form I guess.”
“Well, we don’t have a typewriter and we need one. How would you like to go all in with us?” she gently yelled as the puddle separated us again.
She looked perfect for her age. Hell, she was perfect all the way around, always had been…standing there in those goddamn white galoshes. But they were growing on me, like she—the sweetheart and most precious darling of every last puddle in the universe—had many, many, many moons ago.
“Go where, and with whom, and what the hell does go all in mean?” I gently yelled back.
“Well, he’s writing something, a story” she said. “He’s pretty damn good. I’m just here to help out on the inspirational and motivational side of things, if you know what I mean. I’ve read a lot of self-help books and can show you around for awhile, and I also know how to translate hieroglyphics by the way. But we need someone who has a typewriter and who knows his way through the grammatical part of town. You get half. Does that sound like something you might be into?”
“I’m hardly any good at grammar, but you have my complete attention. I’d also like to get a feel for the story first. Maybe see it, before committing?” I said in a dizzy spin. I had lost all concept of what was going on all of the sudden, as the fire from that stupid cigarette earlier began raging even higher, clouding my whole vision.
“Yes silly, you have to see it first to type the words out on paper wouldn’t you think?” she yelled. “Just come on around, or through the puddle, however the hell you want to, and let’s go out to his place in the wild just west of here and you two can talk, while you take a peek at what’s to come. He’s an alright guy, but the story, the story it’s…well, I don’t know how to explain it, but I believe it’s going to be absolutely life-changing.”
“OK, why not!” I said as we rounded a peculiar corner, all of the sudden, there we were both entrenched and drenched, traipsing through a few inches of slippery mud, it was dark, the place smelled like a zoo, and had the feel of an old run down circus, and there we were standing about fifty yards from a barely lit heart-shaped cage. All I could see was the silhouette of a shape of some gentle beast pacing back and forth excitedly. Everything around us was now consumed in flames.
“Let's go!” She said zipping up her coat.
To Be Continued…
Ryan Love
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