Our boy is in trouble again. Belvin has done something. This time it is all over the news. The red drag of stoplights. “Why are we even going?” says Genie.
“It won’t be long, now,” I say in a serene dreaming voice. Like I’m not in the middle of a nightmare. Her question was valid. What could we do? What could we ever do with our strange boy? Changing our names might be a good start.
Blue lights swoop in front of us from a side street. I have no choice but to wait. Horns erupt behind me. There is always so much anger in the city. I stare at a white hearse and a long line of black cars following it with miniature gray funeral flags magnetized to their hoods. Icy raindrops start hitting the windshield like fat tears.
“Now this.” Genie put her hand to her head. “I didn’t even want to come. He’s dead to me!”
“Yes, our boy. Our beautiful boy.”
The deceased must have been very popular because the cars never stopped going by. I wonder
what my funeral might be like? A couple of cars outside the crematorium. A post online. Of course, I will always be a footnote to our son’s crimes, that may still be occurring, Genie, too. I see our faces like trapped animals permanently plastered on the internet. An insane chuckle escapes my mouth.
“Are you laughing?”
“No, of course not.” My voice suddenly becomes serious and deeper like the straight man to some comedy routine. The kind played on the gallows.
I pull out into the street following the funeral brigade. They all went left like water channeling to the easiest route going downhill as the cemetery stretches below throwing snips of green grass and tombstones through the trees. We cruise by the last of them in the right lane. Then I hit the brakes like I saw my wife with another guy and switched back in behind them. Genie jerks forward and back with the placid windshield wipers clocking back and forth swiping rain—unending rain.
“What are you doing? That’s not the way.”
“I don’t like Mead—too many stoplights. Cemetery Road will bypass all of it.” This was a lie. I just felt a need to be with the mourners, since I was mourning.
“Whatever. I don’t care what you do and haven’t for a long time.” Genie drops the tube of pure goat’s milk cream. I smell the usual dead flower’ scent. Her hands, sufficiently lathered white and tumble before her. She dabs at a dry pink spot on her nose. Genie’s skin has been flaking for the last three years, coinciding with Belvin’s first criminal incident. Our beautiful boy had always been a strange one.
“I see—I see.”
“You wanted him to go see that psychiatrist. After that, he got worse.” These kinds of statements are designed to hit me like a right cross, but today everything is a soft punch in the shoulder. It’s hard to hurt a corpse.
“They’ll probably shoot him.” I felt the words drifting out of my mouth, like smoke, surprising me with a delicious sense of euphoria. Maybe the light sedative had altered my mood. It was only a Valium, but it felt stronger. A real freedom of unburdening came over me. Like being tied to a malignant cement block for years cutting the rope and watching it drop into the black void.
“He’ll get the needle if they don’t,” says Genie.
“Yes, yes, our beautiful monster.” I watch her and listen to the wipers. We fell into its cadence.
“Yes-yes our monstrous boy.” Belvin had her thin lips and mousy hair. He was a bit of a mouse. I hadn’t admitted this to myself before. I used to shove kids like him around in high school. Give them the ole wedgie. Fruit of the Loom to the middle of their back routine. Girls laughing. Again the insane chuckle slips out. Today I am free to be honest—honest as I can about everything. Our murdering mouse.
I follow the funeral brigade into the cemetery. Driving under a canopy of trees is so different from the city traffic. We crunch over the gravel by the gravestones. Genie just sits there watching the car doors open one by one like a string of wooden wind chimes picking up in the wind. Nicely dressed people in dark suits and somber dresses under umbrellas, make their way through the grass, circling tombstones. Again I had the feeling of water channeling to a hole.
“Where did he get the gun?”
Genie gets into her purse and reads the note once again. “I don’t know. His writing isn’t very clear—all jacked up on meds, I guess.”
“Or lack of medication.” It was an old argument. She sighs. My hands come up and close together into a little steeple. The act of prayer doesn’t fit me well. “Shall we join them?”
We stand on the outskirts of the funeral listening. The yellow umbrella stretches over us. Rain
splashes in mud puddles. Seven soldiers line up wearing see-through rain ponchos. A full honors parade. They look older, like regular-Army. Lifers. Or maybe they rounded some drunks up from the VFW. Drunks now but warriors then.
The first volley of shots cracks over the graveyard. Genie starts laughing, I pull her away.
We are driving down Mead Avenue, getting closer. Helicopters hang in the gray sky like the locusts of the Bible. Sheets of freezing rain coming straight down. Now we hear the red scream of sirens. “Why are we going there? They don’t want us there.”
“To turn ourselves in.” I say with my serene smile.
“Why? I didn’t do anything?”
“You had him, didn’t you?”
“You put him in me.”
“I offered to pay for the abortion.”
“It’s against my religion.”
It was an old argument.
Christopher Ananias
Image: A city street through a rain spattered car windscreen with headlights and street lights seen in a blurred image from Pixabay.com
literally stories 
Christopher
Extremely impressive. It’s terrible what many people must endure due to the vile action of a family member. Marina Oswald’s life has been badly effected for over sixty years. And now, almost weekly, in America something new happens.
Forming a support group for the families of killers sounds like a bad joke, but it probably is needed if not yet in existence.
Thank you for this disturbing, first rate work!
Leila
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Hi Leila
Thank you! I think you may be onto something. These murders, in one way or another, kill their own families too.
Christopher
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A disturbing and uncomfortable read but also one that hooks itself into the reader’s brain and doesn’t let go. Some powerful imagery used to excellent effect!
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Hi Steven,
Thanks for your comments! Glad it was effective. I like what you said about it hooking the reader’s brain. Very cool!
Christopher
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Another gripping and thought provoking story from Christopher and it is so very sad. I am sure that parents thoughts turn to the tiny pink creature that they cooed and smiled over and it is really heartbreaking. Yes, there are poor parents for lots of reasons but how harsh is an evil child. Chilling. – thank you – dd
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Hi Diane
Thanks! Wow! I like your description of “thoughts turn to the tiny pink creature that they cooed and smiled over.” That is visual and powerful, it should be in a story itself!
Christopher
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Christopher,
Filled with mystery and images of wet, eerie cemeteries, old arguments, and mouse-boys. I like the tone of the parents throughout. How they blame each other. It so needed to rain. — Gerry
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Hi Gerry
Thanks for your comments! That’s neat how you pointed out these elements. I was hoping to keep the conflict rolling.
PS: I neglected to thank you for commenting on my last story “After Lloyd.” Somehow I overlooked it, but I did leave a comment.
Christopher
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Christopher
This short story makes true poetry out of real-life tragedy that is happening all around us on a daily basis in the land of the gun, blood, and conquest. The movement in this tale gives it a quiet, near-hypnotic power that the greatest story-telling always has. The spell doesn’t have to last long for it to make a lasting impression. The parables of Jesus, the fables of Aesop and the wordless flower sermon of the Buddha are religious examples of brevity and compression and their unlimited power, when in the right hands, and used for the right intentions.
The MOVEMENT in this story is amazing, the way it never stops or gets caught up in itself just like life does not (because who has ever been successful at stopping the clock in real terms). The embattled couple in the car, the funeral procession, the rain, the shots fired both near and far, are all profound symbols drawn directly from everyday life and they have a Hemingwayesque resonance to them. “The Footnotes” is a great, understated, ironic title that gives this piece its due. In the Land of the Fearful and the Home of the Greedy, we are all footnotes because each and every one of us are secondary to the power of the almighty dollar, even our great, grasping, lowest-common-denominator, bully Fascist Leaders themselves.
The psychology, and the reality, of these characters and this world are even shocking in their subtle effects, which is a paradoxical statement that makes it even more true.
In terms of literary lineage, this piece sits beside Raymond Carver, Flannery O’Connor, Hemingway, Chekhov. And despite the deadly nature of all this, this tale also has a kind of humor to it which also makes it extremely real and true. Because life does have humor, even, sometimes, in the midst of the most horrifying situations of all.
Like all of your stories, this one needs to be perused a minimum of a few times before the reader can begin to truly come to grips with what’s being said in the way it’s not being said. There is zero dogma or ideology in this piece, only human truth. That’s an amazing accomplishment.
The narrator of this tale is an intelligent, self-aware individual. The astute reader of this piece can tell that the author behind the character is even more self-aware and intelligent than the character is. Again, an amazing and subtle accomplishment, something John Keats called “negative capability,” trying to explain Shakespeare.
The American streets come alive in this story, from coast to coast, and in many ways, this says everything we need to know about now! Absolutely fabulous work at every level. THANKS for writing. When grouped together with your other stories especially, this is writing that will last. I can also add that I’m envious of your abilities. The Empire is headed straight into the ditch just like Empires always do and this shows the human cost of it all.
Sincerely,
Dale
PS,
The way the events are happening offstage in this is reminiscent of Greek tragedy in a very subtle way and is a huge part of its power. It’s a technique you’ve used in other stories as well and it’s beyond technically effective.
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PS
Christopher
Leila Allison’s short story masterpiece “The Endless Now” should be perused alongside “The Footnotes” when you get a chance. These two stories, so very different on many levels and wavelengths, are also alike in the way that they can both act as pure models of the contemporary short story form. And this grand statement of mine passes Hemingway’s “built-in, shock-proof bullshit detector” test on all levels and with flying colors, fyi to any who misbelieve me!
D.W.B.
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Hi Dale
Thanks so much for your incredible comments! I think it’s really excellent how you pointed out the movement of the story. I’ve heard that many times in writing. How a story/character must do something… So in this ever-learning process of writing it’s really good to hear this base was covered.
I need to investigate these “the fables of Aesop.” That sounds a little like Salman Rushdie’s tales and fables of India. He writes some great short stories, too. Like “The Little King” which might be true, about a doctor who created a pharmaceutical company selling a nasal type of opioid. Very dark–very human.
Yes I think there are many Footnotes, “In the Land of the Fearful and the Home of the Greedy.” The Lord say’s, one or the other.
Reality does have humor for sure. Even the worst of times come with a smile. I think stories without humor are less rewarding. Maybe hell is a place where no one laughs, except the Devil of-course, lol.
What you said here… “John Keats called “negative capability,” trying to explain Shakespeare.” Wow that is intriguing to consider this… This negative capability. Great insights to this craft of writing!
Empires don’t last… I like the way you said “Empires heading into the ditch.” Maybe after WW II and before Vietnam this place named after some forgotten explorer seemed like the Roman Empire. I’m sure the Romans thought so too, until Gauls sacked them.
I definitely want to read Leila’s “The Endless Now.”
PS I read, “The Classical Student” by Chekhov. That was rather disturbing, almost shocking.
Christopher
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CJA
I think I forgot to hit reply when I left my last comment fyi.
D
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Christopher
Everything you just said in your last comments is absolutely brilliant, filled with scintillating perceptions and observations which all add up to nothing short of an informal/epistolary/and revealing essay on the topic of writing for writers! With just a little tweaking and a few expansions and transitions added here and there, it would/can/will be a brilliant essay on writing. Thanks for sharing all your experiences, feelings, perceptions, etc. Again, some day if you get a chance, you should do a bit of work on this just to shape it up into a slightly more formal form so it equals an “official” essay. All the needed perceptions, ideas, reflections, feelings, knowings, ARE ALREADY THERE. I will be rereading it and thinking and pondering upon it cuz it’s so cool. Thanks for commenting!
Writing is like jazz in many ways because it’s all about riffing off of what others have already done but it HAS TO BE rearranged in such a new way that it takes off into the air and becomes, presto, it’s own new thing, not a simple rip-off of what has come before (which is all that an AI/computer can do or will ever be able to do. For those who want to read boring things, turn to AI now).
(I repeat: for those who do not get bored with the boring mainstream modern world and who wish to read boring things that match their boring personalities: turn to AI now.)
William Butler Yeats – pure genius. His collected poems knocks me on my ass every time I pick it up. One flowing masterpiece after another for three hundred pages. Plus a seemingly “endless” amount of small, short poems that redefine the form while connecting it back to ancient sources at the same exact time. And he got most of his ideas from ghosts and folks in the spirit world – or so he said, and so he believed. Who am I to say he was wrong about this?
I believe you about Dennis Johnson JS – it’s worth that many re-runs and returns. Let me know what you think about Leila’s ghost judge when ya get a chance! Just like Dennis Johnson, worth a million re-readings…
Dale
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Hi Dale
Thanks! I could try an essay on writing–clean it up a bit for sure… I like the style of your essays that are captivating and clear on complex people: Kafka, Buk, Howling Wolf–A musical quality too–plus there’s a story, which really draws the reader.
That’s a good way to put the art of writing… Like “riffing on jazz” and picking up something, but yes it has to be original.
I can’t stand AI! I wouldn’t feel right to have a Chatgpt write my story. That would be a total counterfeit!
William Butler Yeats seems like a really interesting guy. “The Second Coming ” is all I know of his work. One of those staples people pick up going through life.
Christopher
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Can a story be real and surreal at the same time? This piece achieves that. Unsettling, moving, and very well done.
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Hi David
Thanks for your comments!
Christopher
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Christopher
Yes indeed, the movement in your story is truly masterfully done. It’s almost invisible the way it happens in this tale, and the reader is always perfectly grounded just like in life, but it all happens in a very few words, which is even more impressive and effective. The whole world of the story could have been torn from the headlines but at the same time this story tells the REAL story of what’s really going on behind the curtains – and that’s way better than mere journalism. The whole world of your story, the way it includes everything from cemetery to streets to rain to marriage to soldiers to children to discussions of abortion to murder and mystery and helicopters, and all in such a short, natural-seeming space, is amazing! How many rough drafts did you do for this story? Just curious.
Not sure if I know the story “The CLASSICAL Student” by Chekhov, what’s that one about? The one I was talking about is just called “The Student” – it’s where a young student retells the story of Peter and Jesus to two poor women around a fire as night comes on. Nothing else happens in it, only that. But Chekhov is considered the most prolific short story writer of all time (I think), having penned more than 500 known stories. Runners up include Guy de Maupassant and O. Henry, who both clock in at around 300 a piece. (Raymond Carver completed 72. Flannery O’Connor completed only 31 short stories, proving that sheer numbers are not always very important at all.) I’m pretty sure Chekhov even has more than one story that has the exact same title as other stories of his that are completely different. And in his spare time he treated desperately ill and injured peasants for free (while also giving them cash) and turned himself into one of the greatest playwrights since Shakespeare, not to mention hung out with Tolstoy and dated more than one actress at a time for much of that same time. All in 44 years! Not too shabby at all! No wonder he was tired at the end and exhaustion killed him as much as tuberculosis ever did!
Dale
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Dale
Thanks so much for your comments! I like what you said about separating Journalism and story telling. Writers of fiction need to know this. I think SK said something similar about your not just reporting the black, white, long and short.
I looked up “The Footnotes,” in my folders, and saw five copies. The first was 550 words, but I think it was called something else before that… So there may have been more drafts. Some of my story drafts have been 20-30. Before I realize it’s either something good or I can’t make it work. Kind of a dogged process that keeps coming around. I feel, if I can get some of these stories published then I will be done with them. They are like living things trying to breath and when they’re published in way they die at least for me, unless there’s a part 2. SK said his novels and stories were like dead skin when they were done. Maybe he was just being Stephen King about it… sometimes I write stories and wonder… How did I write that?
I used to think it was nuts to make so many drafts, but I realized other writers do that too. I heard Caver say, he might write something 20 times. SK said he likes to write 6 pages a day of clean copy, which to me is astronomical!
Back to Chekhov… You know it’s funny… I found one called “Student.” then somehow I was one onto “The Classical Student.” It was good though–about the failure of a son. How his mother slaved to get him into a high school. I think “high school” in Russia back then was more like college. Then she turns him over to a house guest for a punishing, and he abuses him, and the ending is what’s most troubling. If you read it, let me know what you think about the last few sentences. While reading it, I thought, this isn’t the one Dale was talking about… lol. Even though there were lessons of life–almost literally.
Chekhov has been a great discovery for me in my old age. I would like to read all of those stories. And you remind me not to forget about Guy De M. I need to get into Flannery O’s work too. She is quite famous. I’ve read a few of O’henry’s which are pretty good for sure. I really enjoy Ambrose Bierce.
Chekhov 44 so young–so many actresses–lol… to pass and all the things he did. He sounds like a very good person too, and must have been a natural writer.
PS I read Leila’s “The Endless Now.” Wow that is an astonishingly good story! It’s very deep and should be ready again to get the full magnitude of it.
Christopher
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Christopher
Thanks for sharing the info about your drafting process. It doesn’t surprise me that you sometimes do that many drafts. It shows in the writing. It’s possible for less advanced writers to do too many drafts and end up making things worse, I do believe, but this obviously ain’t the case in your case. The finished product always reads with a fluidity and ease which seems to belie the multiple drafts that went into it. “The Footnotes” both does, and does not, seem like it was written with multiple drafts. It does because it’s so good and so well-done; it doesn’t because it reads in such a fluid, “lifelike” way, which is part of the magic trick that is art. Hemingway said, “I rewrote the ending to A Farewell to Arms 39 times.” One of the most simple, most devastating endings of all time!
I also really liked David’s comment where he said “The Footnotes” feels both real AND surreal same time. He’s really onto something there. There’s something mythic/mystic behind the realism of your tales that gives them that double-edged sword quality he’s talking about. Bravo!
And YES, Leila’s “The Endless Now” is great the first time, and it gets better every time one reads it again because one keeps on seeing more, realizing more.
I have another recommendation for you. You should check out Leila’s story called “Advice From the Otherside: How to Avoid Literary Success in Life and Be Considered a Genius in Death By The Late Judge Jasper P. Montague, Quillemender.” This one will have you LOLing many multiple times! And it’s great on a first reading, but also keeps on giving more on subsequent re-reads. One amazing thing about it is that it seems like it’s by the same author as “The Endless Now” on one level; but on another level, this story is in a completely different mode, though JUST as successful artistically!
This is a ghost story for writers, or anyone interested in true literary art, that should not be missed! Check it out when you get a chance and let me know what you think! It has so many levels and layers (and laughs) in it it will blow your mind.
There’s a famous quote about Chekhov from one who knew him personally: “He made everyone who came in contact with him want to be more like themselves.” I can’t think of anything better someone can do for someone else! Rock on, Chekhov! Your gorgeous actress girlfriends took you for a selfish narcissistic a–hole jerk like when you said “I need to live alone because I value my privacy” but we don’t hold that against you any more!
Dale
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Dale
You’re welcome and thank you for your excellent feedback! The drafts do stack up sometimes. I keep them too because as you say things can get worse. I put dates on them instead of numbers. I fool around and work on one that is say three years old or last month or today and work on it for a week. What feels like a waste is when they don’t work out. So those go to the wayside and then the work or rework is ignited again by whatever I’m reading– a phrase or a scene will take me back to an old story that doesn’t really leave my mind. Writing stories somehow becomes more real and easier to remember than reality itself. I think it is the single mindfulness of the work. The pouring over it while the world the ” rough beast, slouches toward Bethlehem. ” WBY
Editing is a tricky business. Raymond Carver said he put his work in a drawer and when it was “cold” after a couple of weeks he reread them. I can relate to that like a detective with “fresh eyes” on a cold case.
This writing process used to be a mystery to me. When I was mainly a reader besides my poetic attempts. When I hear about writers doing more or less the same things I do and have been doing for awhile now–it still amazes me. The first time I thought of it as a craft was when I read SK’s book “On Writing a Memoir to the Craft.” But even then I really didn’t get it. It’s in the practice where the writer learns and of course the reading. It’s all pretty fun, and hard, but so worthwhile. And there’s a slim chance a person might be remembered. Maybe an old lost friend or distant forgotten relative might Google my ass and say oh look, he wrote stories or something. lol.
Yes I like David’s comment too and all of yours! “The real and surreal” is great to hear. That’s a fine goal to aspire to for this kind of story. Sometimes when I hear some really good comments about my writing it almost strikes a terror in me like OMG I might be getting somewhere with all of this writing. If that makes sense.
“Advice From the Otherside: How to Avoid Literary Success in Life and Be Considered a Genius in Death By The Late Judge Jasper P.” Wow is that quite a title, and sounds like a pretty good goal. I was definitely taken by the “Endless Now” that is a great title and subject. So I’m definitely going to read this one too, thanks! Everyday I try to read a short story. And you won’t believe this, but I’m back on Jesus’ Son again for the third time in the last few months. I love listening to Will Patton narrate. I thought I would burn myself out but I’m not! there is too much to enjoy and learn.
“He made everyone who came in contact with him want to be more like themselves.” That is a really interesting quote. Iv’e never heard it put in such a way. but that would be nice if someone encouraged you to be yourself. Especially someone like him a literary giant. When a lot of people are either trying to tear you down or get you to be a likeness in their own image.. Chekhov will be there at the end. No we can’t hold anything against our dear friend Anton.
Christopher
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Hi Christopher,
This was brilliant.
It’s horrific to think how you would react if you were ever related to some type of killer.
People have a weird fascination for the culprits but how much thought or hatred do they send out to the families??
I thought the narrative was brilliant throughout as was their interaction which was understandably cutting. This came to a head with those last seven lines. The sparseness of them made them even more powerful.
And I thought this line was outstanding:
These kinds of statements are designed to hit me like a right cross, but today everything is a soft punch in the shoulder. It’s hard to hurt a corpse.
All the very best my fine friend.
Hugh
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Hi Hugh
Thanks, glad you liked it! That means a lot!
Yes the families are left behind and blamed for their monster’s actions.
Christopher
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A somewhat confusing but intriguing story, I wasn’t sure if Belvin has been caught yet… the story says his crimes may be continuing…. and Genie’s laughing at the shots fired…. sounds like the parents are covering for him. And now, possibly turning themselves in. In that case, the story takes on a whole different meaning.
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Superb story with some wonderfully evocative descriptions. “Icy raindrops like fat tears” was a personal highlight. I think that one will stay with me.
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Hi Alex
Thanks! Glad you liked the story!
Christopher
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Disturbing, as several previous commenters have said, is absolutely the right word, but the writing is deft, compelling and the somewhat splintered voice works really well for a story of such seriousness.
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Hi Paul
Thanks for your comments!
Christopher
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