© Sauce*Box, Fall 1997. All rights revert to author. 

 
Evidence: vignettes
by Andrew B. O'Brien
 

Prologue 

-Dad, are all Vietnam Vets suff'ring from Post Combat Stress Syndrome?

-No, Joey, or course not, where d'you get an idea like that?
-Are you?
-I wasn't in Vietnam, Joey.
-Oh, then where d'you get the AK-47 you keep under your mattress?

Anyone?
 

"Hello?"

"Hi."

"What?"

"You could at least ask how I am...christ...."

"What is it?"

"I've gone through all of the money and it's still really cold here, raining....I'm alone...."

"....it's late...."

Staring at Their Boot Laces.  

-Gotta light?

"I am cop."

-How come I don't feel very protected right now?
"Beg your pardon?"

-Serve and protect, right?
"Oh, yeah, right.... need a ride?"
-Just money, thanks.Thank you.Big of you.Slow, wet, night Hey.Hey, wait! Where you going? Maybe I'll take that ride after all....
 

Small town, not quite a suburb, just north of here.... but how am I'm gonna get home ?

Vehicle 

 She comes into the cafe and sits down next to me.
 

 She comes over, gives me a kiss on the cheek and starts off on a rant about work. I buy her coffee and she settles down, a little. We talk about our days. We talk about the days remaining. We talk about her mother. Her Abortion. Her Wednesday session. It seems it went well, some real breakthroughs were made concerning her mother, the abortion, the days remaining. When there is a sufficient pause, I break in and suggest we get going. We stand up and leave together.

 She is definitely hiding. She has picked a seat in a corner, actually quite close to where I am sitting. Away from any windows. Near the fire exit. She orders a coffee. She seems out of breath, flush; the color in her face makes her look healthy, alive. The color in her face, a flush betraying her pale skin. The color in her face, as if from embarrassment, changes as I watch it. She puts the book in front of her. Sitting cross legged, she shakes out a cigarette and lights it. Tossing her head back to shake out her hair, but then she's cut it short, so the gesture is ineffectual. She falls back on the floor. She wakes up, dressing quickly, late for work."Can I have smoke for the road?" I toss her my pack. She leaves.

 Still in bed, cross legged, I give her a back rub.

 We sit in silence as I touch her shoulders.

 I hold her between my legs.

 "Lets eat!" she says and is up and in the refrigerator and back with a large container of yogurt and two spoons.

Evidence 

 A woman walks past followed by an older familiar looking man.

 "Dad?" Paul says. "Dad? Is that you?"
 "Paul," says the man, who is indeed his father, "Good to see you. What are you doing up at this hour?"
 Paul drops the cigarette casually, hoping his father hasn't noticed, and then steps on it with the heal of his boots, "I....ah....live here, Dad." And thinking this isn't clear enough, "this is where I live, Dad, 2E" A sense of repetition to call into the question, or at least comment on, the absurdity of such a question, as he knew perfectly well where his son lived in fact, insisted on checking the neighborhood to see if was safe and the making sure the apartment was cockroach and rat free.  "What are you doing here?"
 "Me?" his father says, obviously uncomfortable with the question, "I was out for a walk. You know, working late, came out for a breath of air.
 "Sure, sure...."and then, "who was the girl?"
 "What girl?"
 "There was I girl, I thought I recognized her."
 "I don't know...." Paul's father lights a cigarette and looks at his watch. "Your mother's probably waiting up for me, I should get home."
 "Okay. I could make you some coffee for the drive, if you want some."
 "No, no. I'm fine, thanks."
 "Okay."
 "Well....goodbye, Paul."
 "Bye, Dad. Drive carefully."

 It is late. It is late for a Wednesday in this cold region of the world. The stores are shut. The bars are occupied by older men. The cold bites through her thin canvas jacket. The street lights form some protection. But then again, this has happened before. This feeling. Since it's cold and the slush on the sidewalk is seeping into her shoes, she quickens her pace. She wants a cigarette, mostly so that her hands have something to do, but she has no matches. She passes a young man sitting on on stairs. She stops in front of him and in an overly loud tone says, "hi!" And then leans forward, almost over the young man, so close he could smell her, and says, in an urgent hushed manner, "Light my cigarette and act like you know me.....

 A woman walks down the street. She is being followed by an older man. She does not turn around to look at him, but judging by the look on her face, worried, furrowed brow, what have you, she knows. She ducks into a store and the older man walks on. In the store which happens to be a bookstore she asks for a copy of Anna Karenina, it is the first title that comes to mind. But before the man behind the counter can answer her, she looks out the window and then walks out. The man who she suspected of following her is making a call from the pay phone just beyond the store. She shrugs off the experience as coincidence and walks on. As she passes the pay phone she hears her name being said rather loudly by the man as if the man is just making sure that Anna is aware of his presence. She continues walking. Still unsure, still carrying her portfolio with the drawing she's done at the figure drawing class she has just left. As she rounds the corner of the block, she sees out of the corner of her eye the older man hang up the phone and jog after her. She ducks into an dark alley. Tripping trough the dark she finds an open door, leading into the same bookstore she had just come out of. She enters the store and goes immediately into the literature section, and begins browsing through the "T's." When she does not find the book on the shelves, she asks if they have Anna Karenina. No, they do not. And the man behind the counter who looks if he could be the son of the man following her, says, "but I would be glad to order it for you."

 It is more a vague suspicion that she is being followed than actual knowledge. She is reacting to something within, and she knows this, and if it is inside, she can control it, she can take actions to prevent or encourage. Always a question of control. Not to say that the man hadn't been real. He was real which reaffirmed her own sense of being real, of being alone, of being a woman.

 Paul looks around for the man whom she said was following her but can't find him so he goes along with her acting like he knows her saying so how are you its been so long I'm glad you came by there's something I want to show you. And then it just kind of slips out, he's not very good at this sort of thing, wait a minute I do know you. And she tries to shush him but he goes on, you were asking about some book you kept going on about it what was up with that anyway. And she laughs as if he's said something very amusing, but the laugh is so loud and so fake it couldn't be directed at him. So he laughs with her. Loudly and fake. And then he asks her if want to come in out of the cold and she looks behind her, over her shoulder, and backs slowly away from Paul and looks down the street, then says, "no, that's not possible" and walks away.

 Paul's father came by unannounced with briefcase full of papers to sign regarding his grandmother's will.

 "You should have called first."

Bookstore Romance 

 Moments before she came into the store, Paul was struggling to replace the register tape which was supposed to just snap into place but for some reason it didn't seem to fit at all. He looked up as she came in, as was his standard reaction to any customer, male or female, and smiled at her to greet, welcome, encourage her to stay awhile. She was dressed entirely in black and was drench to the bone. She paused for a moment to close her umbrella, to dry her glasses and wipe any drops of rain from her forehead, taking deep long breaths, luxuriating in the scent of the store. The smell of coffee and books. And then with a nervous glance over her shoulder she strode directly to the counter and asked for a copy of Anna Karenina.
 Paul, a bit nervous, still new at the job, eager to please, jumped into action. She gave him a curious look and followed him to the Ts where he suddenly dropped to his knees and began running his fingers over the bindings, reading the titles in a hurried mumble.
 The book was not there.
 But before he told her this, he thought that she looked as if she might be related to him, perhaps a cousin, the kind you saw once a year as a child at your families summer cabin on the lake and went skinny dipping with and who later in life would give you flirtatious glances across the dance floor at weddings. Paul had no such cousins but there was something familiar about this woman, the awkward way she held her hands together in front of her mouth with her elbows pressed tightly together, the way she looked around the store without moving her head, as if she were about to roll her eyes and sigh or comment on the way the shelves were arranged.
 -The book is not here.
 She looked around the store, almost absently, as if she hadn't heard him at all and then said, -do you mind if I just look around? She began to wonder almost aimlessly not really looking at the books, running her hand along the tops of shelves, checking her hand for dust, every now and then picking something up, showing a bored interest in it and then putting down where it didn't belong.

 If it had been crowded Paul might have thought she was trying to steal something. He tried to understand her gestures. He tried to place her somewhere else in his mind. It seemed to him that if he had bumped into her somewhere other than the store, they were be getting along just fine by now. His job was getting in the way, forcing them into a customer/server relationship. Now he had to watch her as a potential thief. Now he had to finish with the register tape. And now he had to x out and update the inventory before closing instead of browsing with her, instead striking up a conversation and asking her out for coffee.
 She stayed mostly by the window, which was, as Paul saw it, either an attempt to see something outside or be seen. Perhaps she had been waiting for someone, tired of being wet and cold, she had come into the store and not wanting to just stand around awkwardly, had asked for the first book that came to mind. There was reluctance to her, as if she did not want to be there at all. Perhaps she had been stood up.
Paul said, -I could order it for you, if you want?
 She said, -No, that would take too long.
 -Only a few days
 -That's too long. I'm leaving for France on Monday.
She was right, it was Friday and even if the order went out Saturday morning, the book wouldn't arrive until Wednesday, at best.
 Paul said, -Lucky you.
 -Yeah, she said, -that me.
 Paul poured himself some coffee from the pot they kept behind the counter and waited as she walked around the front of the store in haze. The way she moved, hesitant, as if pushed from behind, as if she were there against her will. It was five minutes after closing. She was frustrated by something, a look of concern on her face, as if she were trying to solve a logic puzzle, but more threatened than that. Not that she was scared or showed any signs of fear. More that she was trying to find the courage to do or say something. It was clear, though, that was in the store for reasons other than buying its merchandise. Something about the function of the space determining the action of the people moving through that space.
 He started tidying up, making it clear that he was getting ready to close. He washed the coffee pot. Alphabetized the order slips. And then began counting the money. Normally he did this after he had locked up and normally he counted the cash first since it took the longest, but just in case she decided to buy something he started counting up the checks and charges.
 Paul said, -Last chance to buy something.
 She simply shook her head and mouthed back the words, -No, thanks.
So he counted the cash. It was the only time during the day that he felt vulnerable. Something about all that money sitting out there in the open, even when the doors were locked, set his imagination going. He saw someone bashing in the window and leaping through, holding a gun up to Paul head. But more importantly he saw himself defending that few hundred dollars with his life. Getting himself shot and then beating his assailant into submission and being lauded as a hero for putting so much at stake for so little money.... hospital bed interviews, his name in the paper, a medal from the police. The cash total came to two hundred seventy eight dollars and fifty one cents. Not a bad day considering checks and charges.
 -Look, he said, -I'm going to have to kick you out. It was never an easy thing to do. Every now and then there was someone who stayed to the very last moment and there was always a little bit of guilt involved because the store could use every little sale. But this had nothing to do with money. He wished she had come in a hour earlier just so he could have spent that much more time watching her. Not that it was anything sexual, not that she wasn't attractive, but he liked seeing her react to him in her silent manner. He liked being alone with her in a room. Something about her self consciousness make his easier to ignore. A pleasant distraction.
 -So soon?, she said as if acknowledging the tensions between them by commenting on the absurdity of the formal nature of the situation. A playfulness in her voice, perhaps trying to bring to light the natural assumptions one would make on her behavior. Perhaps, even, admitting to her own excitement at finding herself alone in an empty store with a perfect stranger. Her words, the way she spoke them, giving Paul a sense of authority, knowledge, control, partially confirming his suspicions and partially creating more intrigue. And this, he liked.
 -I gave you fair warning. He chose his words very carefully, searching for the right ambiguities.
 -I know, she said, -but its raining. She still had that look of a wet dog, something pathetic about her, but even still she didn't seem like she would want someone like Paul. She was more the type who would have an athletic boyfriend at home, someone who put up with her artistic leanings and took her fishing in the fall.
 -Sorry. And with that he walked to the back of the store to check the back door. He thought this unnecessary trip would settle it once and for all. If she hadn't left when he returned, he'd ask her out for coffee, just the thought of which clogged up his throat, made his heart pound with nervousness, a reaction Paul had always suffered whenever he was consciously aware of the fact that he was about to make a forward move. He'd actually reached the where he could double his heart rate simply by imagining a scene such as this.
 She didn't leave. So, with considerable mental effort he said, -look, if you aren't in any sort of a rush to get anywhere, would like to grab a cup of coffee with me?
 There it is.
 She looked out through the window as if the weather was going to decide for her and said, -yes, Id like that Paul.

Camera Lucida 

 Anna is no longer in the bathtub and we have not had sex in two days so, it is impossible to imagine what she is doing right now.

 Margo wishes to speak to me alone. She has a problem. I cannot help her; I do not know why she keeps insisting on speaking to me. I wish she would go elsewhere for this kind of thing.

 To reach out at a time like this? Ask for a helping hand, to say I need you, admit defeat? Say to Anna, I need someone to live for because I cannot live for myself? I used to be so capable of this, of solitude, of existing for no one, but at that time, I was surround by more people, and there was always someone there (I am speaking of school) so I could always imagine the other side of things, I could always imagine solitude as the ideal existence. And the distance I placed between me and my friends was easy to maintain, but also easy to bridge. But now I have isolated myself in such a way that I cannot even reach myself. I have no plan. I work. I draw. I see Anna when I feel like enough time has passed since my last visit.

 There is a man roughly Paul's age, maybe a little older, sitting on a balcony which is nearly identical to his, smoking, and not wearing enough clothes for the weather. He must be cold. There are now two and if we sit out here long enough, there will be more; there are many balconies on the street. There will be an entire street lined with people out on their balconies, smoking and freezing. These two look alike. Their positions, the way they sit, what they appear to be doing. But on closer inspection, as we know, the image deceives us. One side acting as a representation of the other; one side in contrast to the other; one side juxtaposed against the other. But we have to look beyond what we see immediately. We have to look inside their apartments to really know what the comparison is all about. And then we have to look at the details. What's on the desk. What's on the answering machine. What's in the refrigerator. What's waiting inside for them. This will give us reasons, explanations for their separate but similar settings. What matter's to these people? Partial knowledge might be obtained by a visit or tour of their homes, but complete knowledge would require long term observation. Which Paul is quite prepared to do.

Correction 

 She comes into the cafe and sits down directly in front of him.
 "Oh, Paul, I'm so glad your here. I'm so anxious for some reason."
 "How was the job?"
 "Oh, I don't think it was that.... he was nice, respectful and very professional about it all."
 "Can I buy you a coffee or something?"
 "Sure, but I what I really need is good fuck, that always seems to relax me. Especially that long, hard cock of yours.... after you've been doing me for an hour or so, from behind like you do, there's nothing on my mind."
 "Maybe I can accommodate you later. But for now, how about that coffee."

 After dinner, and I don't know why, but I expect to run into one of her friends. Maybe because I've only heard about them but have never met them. But we go to a bar anyway and it's empty for what seems to be all the right reasons. I don't dare ask if it's a place she goes to often. If she is a regular here. The waitress doesn't know her, which is a point in her favor, and maybe she was just nervous, and wanted to duck into the first place she saw. But I had said I wanted a quiet place, not very crowded.... . so there we were, in place with no atmosphere. I've ordered a scotch and she a manhattan. We are able to laugh at little things. We are able to talk about are pasts. She tells me about her abortion. And then we talk about films.

 Unfortunately, the type of condoms I had bought were slightly too small for me, and the constricting forces of the rubber prevented me from loosing my erection. I don't think that she had noticed I had already ejaculated and so continued to work herself into frenzy. I watched her on top of me with the calm, objective perspective that always comes after an orgasm. While I felt the physical sensation, the heat, the dampness of sex, and while I saw the image of my penis disappearing into her, and heard her moans and whimpers, and felt her body shudder through me, I could not participate in the least. I was distant, cold and analytical.

 The phone was ringing when I got home. It was Anna not quite sure what to make of what had just happened. She felt bad about having sent me away so soon. I told her not to worry about it and that we'll talk about it tomorrow. She was having doubts. I was quite satisfied with our apparent lack of direction. We now had the goal of getting it right. She said she was exhausted from the hours we spent on the floor, but could not sleep. I asked her if she wanted to come over here to sleep. She said no and hung up.

 The phone is ringing. It is Margo. It is Stephen. It is Thomas. It is the police telling me that the radio has been taken from my car. It is my father. I tell him the news. He suggests the Benjamin/ Johnson Detox Center where he spent the better part of six weeks. But I'm not addicted to anything. He says I'm in denial. He says I need help. He says I'm no son of his. He says he's worried about me. He says he is waiting for me to get a job. I say I have a job. He says I am nothing. I am worse than nothing because I cause him pain. He says I should go to church. He says I deserve nothing from him, that I deserve this. He says I should see someone. He says I'm fucked up. Meaning I should have therapy. Meaning I need a psychiatrist. Meaning a psychiatric ward. Meaning an institution. I can sleep now.

 I want the phone to ring.

In Which She Represents A Threat 

 Of course, it doesn't always happen that way. One time, she came up to the door just as Paul had locked it and turned the sign to closed. She mouthed, -Please to him until he let her in. She seemed urgent enough. He locked the door behind her. She went straight for the literature section and began reading the titles in a hurried mumble until she said, -What I am looking for I cannot find.
 Paul walked over to where she was standing and pointed out to her that the book was missing. But before he did this, he knelt down and ran finder over the dusty shelves and then with air of suspicion, as if he had stumbled onto some grand mystery, said, -Yes, it appears to be missing.
 She didn't move.
 Neither of them moved.
 An acknowledged understanding in a moment of silence.
Then Paul, still kneeling, felt her bend over him, from her waist to have a look for herself. And she was so close to him that if she had had long hair it would fallen on his shoulder. He could feel her breath on the top of his head. He turned quickly and their eyes were just inches apart. Then he kissed her. Their eyes pinned open. A sense of surprise even though the move was wholly predictable. And then her hands fell on his shoulders and she turned him so she could get a better angle. And then gently she laid him down on the carpet and knelt over him. -Paul, she said reading his name tag and then she unzipped his fly and lifted her skirt. And they were fucking on the floor, knocking books off the shelves, covering themselves with the smell of a print and sex.
 After, they go to a cafe together and talk for hours.
 Another time, she entered the store and asked for a copy of Anna Karenina and when Paul said it wasn't there, she sighed visibly. But this did little to cheer him up. All day long he had had the feeling that he was going to die. He didn't know how exactly, but he expected something dramatic, something forced with a level of intent. Not that he is a superstition man, but it didn't help being left all alone in the store after dark, knowing that eventually he would have to make the long walk home to his empty apartment. The feeling that something was waiting there for him. Not that this was an uncommon feeling for Paul, but it had been getting harder and harder to ignore. At any rate, he wasn't about to kick her out.
 She looked around the store absently, trying to give off the appearance of a lost dog, trying to draw Paul's attention to her. It was the same old thing. Another Friday night, another lonely person with nothing better to do than browse through a bookstore trying to find someone one whom she lay he problems. Not that her intentions were so clear to Paul. She coughed slightly, cleared her throat, and when Paul looked she gave him a flirtatious glance. She dropped a book accidently on purpose and then bent over from her waist to pick it up, jutting out her ass, accentuating her curves, bending one knee then the other, her wet dress clinging to body. She kept asking certain books were good. If he had read this one or that. Basically annoying him for no other purposes than arousing an interest in her body.
 Paul busied himself behind the counter. He updated the inventory, alphabetized the order slips, cleaned the coffee pot, counted the money, and when he had nothing else to do he just made himself look busy by flipping the Books in Print, hurriedly writing down whatever came to his mind. But his indifference was having a visible affect on her. A desperate air about her. She sighed audibly and pulled a book from the shelves and sat down on a foot stool, reading silently to herself. Her lips moved as she read. Paul watched her do this. She crossed her legs and as she read Paul could see her thigh muscles wrapped in black stockings contract and relax. He lost track of what he was doing, fiddling with the register tape or something, and just watched her fingers moving across the page, her breathing, her eyes darting back and forth hungrily over the words, one leg slowly rocking over the knee of the other.

 We've all heard stories of this kind. Blatant exhibitionism. The hapless victim who must bear witness. But there it was, all for Paul to see. His eyes trapped on her imaged, his hands idle at his side, not knowing what he should think or do, having been caught totally unprepared to the situation. Finally, she stopped reading and approached the counter with the book. -Do you like this? she said.
 -I haven't read it, Paul said.
 -Its very good. Maybe I can read it to you sometime.
 And with that he abruptly took the book from her hands and said, -Will there be anything else?
 -How about some coffee?

Fear of Music 

 A warehouse with damp brick walls. They walk up the stairs. White. Clean. Rubberized floors. In translation. Industrial light bulb holders. Goes a bit too far. Does what it intents. Clean, though. A clean warehouse stairwell. What we like are the bricks, though. The dampness. The eroding mortar. Of course, on the inside they've been shellacked not to absorb so much light. And the sky-lights. And the long row of white washed windows to diffuse the direct light of the sun. But it's night. To diffuse the harsh light of passing headlights, the swaying street lamps. Inside: grey floors. White walls. Kitchenette. Loft bed. As if the building had always been like this, as if he had been there a long time.

 "We see the figure of a woman, attempting to be defined, but refusing it coldly, defiantly. And the frantic brush strokes, these gestures, here and here and up here, are mere ineffectual attempts. We see an image defined, then redefined over and over, every attempt a failure. It becomes a re-affirmation of the artists own humanity, that this sort of knowledge can never be obtained, nor should it. This painting represents the ultimate act of humility, the sacrifice of ideals, of romantic notions and above all the ego."

 I refused to look at her. Not even her body. I wouldn't speak to her. Or if she would ask me a question I would give one word answers. I did as little as possible to acknowledge her presence. And I made this obvious to her.

 Maybe it was her hand on my crotch that changed everything. Or the look on her face, the thrill I saw, as I pounded through the gears in rapid succession.

 I watched the sun rise. I watched the shifts change at the iron works. I watched lights come in windows across the courtyard. Salesmen getting dressed for interviews. Flowers opening up to the sun. I watched the dew turn for grey to silver. I watched clouds disappear. I looked at everything there was to see outside the window. I went into the bathroom and relieved myself.

 A medical condition caused by something in the family genes, heritage, something vaguely American. It still gives me problems because its not caused by anything I eat or do, more the way I think. Maybe by the things I don't eat. Some male version of anorexia, control this is me, but no, this is me. Sociologically caused by the concept of thinness. Psychologically to control what gets in. If I don't like it I can turn it off, but then I am accused of being uninformed, undernourished. Accusation always fly. To accept that I enjoy indulging in things so common, so primal, that would be to admit that I am human, a side-affect seen in my aversion to eating noises, to large groups of people without manners, without concern for my sensitivities. Only that has a history too and can be seen in my relationship to my sister, just a mild irritation on the surface.
 

 They show me slides of their fishing trip to Chile. Mountains. Lakes. And look! There's a fish. And, look, there's another one! Mom buying socks in the market. Dad in his waders. And the socks fit like a charm. And Dad tells me of the women in see-thru blouses, "all over the place," he says, "in restaurants, at the market, the airport, the embassy...
 " What, Dad, no pictures?! And we laugh, we nudge each other in a
way we imagine fathers and sons are supposed to laugh and nudge each other. And for this one moment, for one fake, superficial, out of character moment we laugh with pride and confidence. But he takes it too far. He shows me his American car, his new station wagon. "But the door panel rattles," he says, "get in, let's see if we can find the rattle." And I am driving out the driveway again with my father behind the wheel. And I am listening to the sounds of his new car, with its V 6 engine, room for six; it's just him and Mom now, and I can't hear any rattle.

 I sliced my finger open today while carving tomatoes for a salad. Then after that while doing the dishes I broke a glass and cut my hand in two places.

 My father has this idea that if somehow I am a good son, that will make him a good father.

The Animated Corpse 

 I saw my brother playing the part too well, over heard him saying how broken up he was over this tragedy, calamity, this new cloud over the family. He was so transparent, false, I don't see how anyone could let him get away with this. I went to him asked if he was sincere about suffering such a loss. But he gave me a look like was out of line, like I shouldn't be sarcastic at a time like this. And life was a serious thing, so watch your step. Not a time to bring up the old bones. Not a time for this display of contempt. Not the place to be your cynical self. Not the family you would have thought they were. Not the person you would have thought you were. You don't fit in. You leave.

 I feel dirty after the drive. I want a shower and there is no hot water.

 They are a love story. Paul and Anna have found each other, found themselves through each other. The have united. They met, they fell in love, and now they live together. They are happy. It is a happy ending. They say they are just beginning. Each day they learn something new about the other. Each day they fall more and more in love. People look at them and are envious. They are what you want to be. They share in each other's misery and make everything okay. I hate them. They make me sick. They look ridiculous. They talk ridiculously about pretty things. They never entertain. They never speak of the dark side of the relationship. They have all but forgotten their troubled beginnings. It is difficult for them to even muster a joke about how they met. All that they forgot.

 It was a spring day in Maine. I felt like I was dying.
 I want to say that something happened as a result of the last thing that happened, but I can't remember the last thing that happened and I knew nothing was going to happen. I simply would continue. An ellipsis from here on out. Etc., Etc., Etc. Could I say something happened as a result of my being here on the water? No. As a result of my going home to an empty apartment? No. As a result of my drawing a two hundredth still life in my apartment? No, but, I am getting quite good at drawing.

 There was no sea. The air is thick with salt and the odor of mud. There are no giant sea swells crashing against the rocks. Gentle waves roll in over the mud flats and are lost before they reach the embankment below me. It is the mouth of a river. Where the oil is brought in. Where there used to be a draw bridge. Where there is a protective harbor. And if I think of punishment, I was never hit, spanked or slapped, I was always sent to my room.

 This seemed to happen nearly everyday.

 Go to your room!
 

* * * * *

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