The Dance,

by Mary Daurio

root beer 

                                    

     Frightened by the West Nile Virus that’s invading our little corner of Ontario, John's out shooting crows. How a mosquito could land on a crow to bite it is beyond me. I guess they do. He found a dead crow two days back. The damn thing was in the water trough. The coroner’s report, death by drowning. Not West Nile.

     There is no coroner, but yours truly. Still, he carries on. I wouldn’t mind as much, but he’s been drinking. Not soggy, he can load the gun, and he has one crow to his credit. It’s just he is aiming in the direction of the chicken coop. If he hits my rooster or hens, it won’t be West Nile he needs to fear.

     I take him bug spray.

     ‘Get that out of here. It’s all chemical,’ John hollers.

     Never mind, he’s probably about eighty proof. That's an exaggeration, but still, he’ll never notice the bites. Poetic justice, him getting bit by mosquitoes that may carry the West Nile. Or is that ironic? Whatever there is no talking to him while he’s in this state. I go back inside to finish making supper.

     Dusk settles, and in he stomps plunking the gun in the corner of the room.

     ‘It’s not loaded, is it?’ I ask.

     He raises his eyebrows in a bushing expression saying all he has to. It was those talking eyes that first drew me to him way back then in the heat of passion, before children and grandchildren, a lifetime ago. Sometimes even now, I look at him and get a pain in my side of love, and anguish.

     ‘What’s for supper?’ John asks. Really, with the smell of corned beef in the air.

      ‘I was afraid it might be rooster.’

     ‘Don’t be ridiculous! I was miles from the coop.’

     That’s not what I saw, but I keep my own counsel. Some things are easier let go, especially on a night like tonight. The local newspaper had a story about a crow testing positive for West Nile a few counties over from our farm. That's all it took to trip one of his dark moods. Best to just let it go. I decide to overlook the gun, in the corner and get the table ready for supper. Silence fills the air, that thick electric feeling just before a thunderstorm. It’s been tipping tough these days with cattle prices down, and the seeding costing more- well, just about everything costing more.

      ‘I have pie.’

     ‘That would be nice.’

     That’s what we have between us. Once a roaring romance settles for polite passivity. Is this what happens to people who live together and share their lives? Does it all have to be eaten away?

     Oh, John, what a dancer he was! People would stare. We haven’t been to a dance in twenty years. What would all those girls who wished they were me say if they could see us now? Anna Marie, especially. She would cut in on John and me back then. I’d smile and back away as he was going home with me, after all. To the best of my knowledge, he’s been faithful. The farm, that’s his other love, and I can’t say I’ve not been jealous a time or two.

     ‘I’m going with Joe to an auction tomorrow.’

     He brings me out of my reverie, and I startle a little at his voice.

     ‘Don't need anything. Just want to see how the cattle and machinery go. Home for supper.’

     ‘Ask Joe in for the meal, if you like.’ Joe's farm is across the way. Widowed five years, and we have him over often. The men help each other back and forth when they have tough jobs to do. 

     ‘Yes, that would be a thought. Nice pie.’

     ‘Thanks,’ I say.

     We ignore the tension between us and concentrate on the mundane little threads that twine us together. The safety net of the day to day that we often land in without any conscious thought.

     He leaves the table and heads outside again to tinker with this machine or that. Haying season is just about here. He has a lot more to do than shoot crows. The gun stands a silent vigil in the corner. I’m not touching it, that’s for damn sure. Stand on guard the rest of the week for all I care.

     Instead of saying what is really bothering him, he sinks into the farm and all she needs. What about me? I want to scream. Is that selfish, or just self-preservation? I don’t know, but somehow, I feel dwindled. Diminished, but not discarded. He spends more time maintaining his machinery than the time of day he gives me. I often wonder if he would notice if I served supper in the nude. I won’t try it. What if he didn’t notice?  

      He’s up early today, and with the chores done, off with Joe. The day stretches ahead of me, and I have new energy. After every thunderstorm, the air clears and sparkles.  It wasn’t much of a storm between us last night, but enough to send me tossing and turning, finally going to sleep in the spare room. John says nothing about that this morning. Sad, but he is all business and auction. Where did your wife sleep last night, John? You who counts every cattle head. Well, at least I know where I stand. The air, while not exactly sparkling, is clear. We didn’t have a thunderstorm, more like my own tumultuous sheet lightning.

     I need to keep busy, so I make a couple more pies. Joe can take some home. I miss Joe’s, Sarah. We had a friendship, close and consoling. I think of her when I offer Joe a meal or send him a pie.

     Moulding all that dough, and flattening it with the rolling pin, is a type of therapy for me. With the children gone, John and I don’t need much pie, so it’s good to give some of that labour away. For the fowl supper at the church, I make ten pies. Just like that. Anyone who knows anything will say its sublimation. Oh, I read the kids' textbooks. 

     Things were different before they left for school and then started lives afterward. John is disappointed that none of the boys wanted to farm. When they were all home, life revolved around them and their needs. Ours went on the back burner. The same happens to a lot of folks. You lose your essence, the part that gives you your reason to be. John is finding his in the land and the farm he loves.

     I can’t compete.

     He’s got about two hundred acres.  All five foot four of me, laid out flat, wouldn’t be one-hundredth of an acre. Talk about a lightweight. I must be going crazy. He might be too. 

     I worried about him last winter when there was less to do, and he moped around, but spring has his engine running. He spends each waking hour working his fingers to the bone. He drinks on occasion, but nothing that has sent any alarms off yet, except for the crows.

     The men return from the sale, and the meal is ready. The conversation is contained and stilted.

     ‘Thanks, for a nice dinner, Alice,’ Joe says.

     ‘How was the auction?’ I ask.

     ‘The cattle went cheap, and the machinery followed suit. Can’t make anything farming, and can’t make anything getting out. Eh, John?’

     Up go John’s eyebrows. He has been unusually quiet this evening. Oh, he answers questions, but he doesn’t initiate anything. I wonder how he was at the sale with Joe. They have known each other most of their lives. Joe can usually get him out of the deep dark blue. No easy feat.

     Joe takes his pie and thanks me.

     I say, ‘We’ll have to do this again soon, never mind waiting for an auction.’

     ‘That would be nice. Thanks again, Alice. Bye, John.’

     A silent wave from John, the screen door catches, and we are alone again. I thought he would come home in good humour from the sale. Joe is always pleasant company and even with things how they are farming, they commiserate and often share a joke.

     I start to clear the dishes, and he leaves. My feet ache, so I throw my shoes off one at a time into the corner. I take another look, at the empty corner. 

     The gun is gone!

     I hear a shot and a crunching noise.

     Oh, Lord, no!

     Running out, I see him aiming at the barnyard where all the cattle are milling around.

     ‘John, stop! For God’s sake, quit it.’

     He’s ready to fire again but stops and turns to me like he’s seen me for the first time.

     His eyes look directly at me and his mouth grimaces. ‘Alice, what am I doing?’

     ‘I’m not sure. Did you hit one?’

     ‘No,  I was aiming at the weather vane, the bullet hit the barn.’

     His hands tremble a  little as he lays the gun on the grass. I take him in my arms. John holds me close and then takes a few steps. I realize we are dancing under the flickering illumination of the yard light, the moon and stars a canopy above us. The soft grass is a carpet beneath my bare feet, and those sweet tender steps of old send chills down my spine and bring tears to my eyes.

     He holds me close and whispers in my ear.

     ‘Alice, we need to go dancing more.’

 

About the author 

Mary Daurio is a grandmother who likes to fiddle with words, toot her flute, and spend time with family. She has had works published kindly by Cafelit, The Fictional Cafe, Pure Slush Anthologies, Grey Borders, The Harrowsmith, Spillwords, Medium, and Friday Flash Fiction. 

 

My Father, Eddie the Butcher

 

by Dan A. Cardoza 

root beer

 

 

Hi, my name is Massey. My name is Germanic, with deep roots in measuring and judging. Up until recently, my life has not measured up. 

I visit my father's grave twice a year, now. I'd visit more, but there's no point; we were spiritual, hardly sentimental or religious.  

My father Eddie was bigger than life, though he never acted the part. Even if weren't for his large granite tombstone, you'd be hard-pressed not to notice him, the rectangular bulge in the earth, the different species of rye over his coffin. The groundswell is the look and shape, width and length, of a meat market butcher block.  

~~~ 

When I was a little, mother would bore me with her incessant blather about the time she'd bet the birth doula even odds at $50.00 that my father Eddie would show up late for my birth. She hadn't explained how he was the only community butcher, worked longshoreman's hours, or that a lot of customers depended on him. So in a sense, mother was cheating. 

The same story often varied in arc, but the plot always remained the same. She fed me her rant in spoonfuls of a children's vocabulary, carefully choosing the words I could swallow without choking. The back-story’s essence was how much she resentment being married and giving birth to her only child in the first place. 

I clearly recall my last shampoo. I was gazing up at the ceiling, being very patient with my twice-weekly hair scrub. I was flat on my back, calm as a corpse on the vintage kitchen Formica counter. My hair was a cornflower waterfall, cascading over the edge of the chipped porcelain sink.   

"Daughter, you know you're loved when the obstetrician has to wrestle you away from your father's tight-end, bloody paws."  

As she droned on, deep cleaning turned into scouring. As usual, she failed at football analogies too.  

 "At least he showed you, passion girl. Showed up right on time. Did I tell you I lost the bet with the doula?" she’d said. 

I didn’t have the heart to tell her, I’d heard the same ole story scores of time. 

Through soap burned eyes, I could make out her avian sadness, feel the sharpness of her talons as they began to clinch the walls of my skull. After her claws evolved into fingers again, she squeezed out the remaining shampoo, "They were quick," She’d said. "Dr. Cunningham and the doula recovered a fumble at the finish line." 

Mother claimed that she was exhausted back then, when I was born, over-medicated from the difficult labor, and a bit confused as usual.  

She'd always end the damp shampoo lecture with, "From that day forward, you were never easy to hold." 

Mother’s facts were often convoluted. Truth is she was resentful that father wouldn't let go of me for all his worth. He was fully committed. Mother was committed over the years, three times to the psychiatric wards. I was less embarrassed than relieved.  

After the final rinse, my mother would pat my hair squeaky fresh with a dry towel. That felt the best until she buffed, and fluffed and ratted my hair into knots and nests, in what was an effort for her to distract me so I couldn't see her real thoughts. Most of the time, she seemed angry, not present, except when she told her wild tales.   

"After they stole you, the fumble, back from your father, he was forcibly removed from the delivery room by Sumo wrestlers who worked the security detail at the Kaiser Permanente Hospital.” 

~~~ 

All and all, I remember a mostly happy childhood, one with a special connection to at least my father, no matter the distance my mother attempted to create. For her part, mother was out of reach, or in another room. There were no brothers or sisters, "One was damned well enough,” she’d often said. 

As for father, he was a quiet and ponderous man. He was a hulk of a man, plank-shouldered, and gruff on the eyes when you first met him, an earnest. My father was the dependable, neighborhood butcher. He was Eddie, of Eddie’s Bounty of Meat.  

What he brought home for supper was always deemed a surprise. Memory has a way of marinating and softening most things. Father didn't cook much, but when he did, his meals were superb.  

When I was very small, on special occasions, my father Eddie would bring home slabs of baby-backed ribs. He'd barbeque them on the grill, conjure them into tender Baby-Ray sauce keyboards, as sweet as any karaoke rendition of, 'My Cherie Amour,' by the famous Stevie Wonder. And there was the occasional Rib-eye’s, unsold T-bones, and filet mignon steaks too. To be honest, everything tasted better when father cooked. He threw his heart into it. But of course, I was sensitive to never let on to mother. 

I recall the winter we mostly ate deer venison. That was because of Uncle Charlie's unpaid cutting and wrapping bill from deer hunting.  

In a not so secret back porch shadow, my Uncle muddled on about his debts and land sharks. He’d said he couldn’t pay father a penny. In order to teach his younger brother a lesson, father kept half of the butchered forked-horn buck. And after, he hung the antler spread over the garage door as an anti-gambling totem. It seemed to work; with every visit, my uncle reaffirmed father how he'd quit gambling. Father was fair though and earned the respect of everyone he met.  

Most of the time, mother cooked, if you consider burning things a meal. Most evenings, dinner at our house didn't happen unless there were unsold hocks, back-strap scraps, or chunky scraps from rump roasts. Father preached all things meat at the large planked kitchen table. "The closer to the bone, the sweeter the meat," he'd said. Even as a child, I understood what the metaphor meant. 

Most evenings, mother would torture fleshy things in a large pressure cooker. The cooker held permanent real estate on top of the cast iron, gridded stovetop. When it rattled, its essence was that of an imposing, hot Kilimanjaro.  

If forced to walk near the steaming works, I'd scurry like a hungry rat to avoid the oncoming explosion. I memorized the ticking time bomb sound coming from the top of the pot. As I’d run past the steaming contraption, it would rattle and hiss until I disappeared. How it quickened my step, shook its angry fist like a guiro.  

Inside the hot chamber could be beef tongue, scalded silent like father's words when presented at the dinner table. On another occasion, the steamer might choose to punish the tripe. Father never had the stomach to confront mother about all her unnecessary drama. And she was the one to always over spice things.  

When dinner was somehow different, it might include sweetbreads with leeks, and tender, balling veal brains. No matter what was cooked, if she wasn’t complimented, she’d run off to her bedroom in tears, slamming the door behind her. I recall one night in particular, when she shouted, "Does everything around has to keep changing right in front of me?" Father and I never complained about the sameness or her cooking. 

Father wasn't picky about when or what mother cooked, though meager, he considered our food substantial. With layers of years and maturity, it grew obvious that no one's cooking fulfilled her.  

I would learn much later when I was much older that when it came to other men, mother reveled herself as a gifted chef. At times, her cooking was confident and sublime, especially when it came to sautéing the tenderloins of wild game for other hungry men. Only then could she be satiated. She’d once told me a psychiatrist explained it was not sinful, it was simply a phase of hypomania.  

Mother kept track of the young men father brought home, drunk from late-night gambling at the corner pub, too shit-faced to turn a steering wheel. Our two tattered sofas turned into cowboy bed bunks.  

When I was a child, my father could only embarrass me at the annual school open-house. No, it wasn't because of his dingy white shirt, the one with cauliflowers at the end of each collar, or the jagged part in his hair he carved with a cleaver.  

It was from his unsubtle handshake with all my teachers.  

I feared that before father would break their hand with his grip, they'd first notice his two fingers' missing tips. When the teacher's gaze was too uncomfortable, father would laugh how his two thumbs were spared the guillotine. God forbid they'd notice either of the stubborn, mashed digits. If they did, he'd deflect their focus by using his rehearsed, infectious bellow of laughter. He'd say, "My thumbs have been pounded thick. They were too slow and dim-witted to dodge the steel mallet, they were."  

I'd find myself digging my perfectly shaped hands in my sweaty dress pockets all night.  

Hands––father's hands couldn't be anything other than iron. After all, he was the first son of a Dutch Boiler Maker. His palms and fingers the pedigree of hammer and anvil, forged in the design and fashion of a bench vice, made for twentieth-century tightening.  

Looking back at my childhood, I'm not sure anyone really cared or noticed either father or me or how we behaved during those short evenings at school, including mother, she never showed up, her damned tarot cards and all.  

At open-house, my father, Eddie, the butcher, was always there with his incise questions. Is my daughter, loving? Does she play well with others? Is she kind, strong-willed, and tough? Father knew me well enough that exceptional grades would follow.  

 

It was during my mother's death bed confession, near the end, that she shared what she was really thinking the day I was born. It seems crazy sells better when you have nothing to lose. 

 "I was so damned groggy, Massey. After the nurse wrestled you back," she rasped, "everything appeared in as a mist or didn't exist. Those strange images still haunt me. Three robed ghosts exited the delivery room, with your father arm and arm." 

"Really mother?" I cynically responded and took another sip of tea at the Mad Hatter's party.   

Mother described her fantastic hallucination. "Sometime later, after I woke in the room, the doula unclouded the mystery. It was two security guards that removed your father from the delivery room. They tossed your father, ass over tea kettle, out into the sweltering heat of the late morning Mayan madness."  

In her fading, vaporous voice, she shaped the convoluted story, "You see Massey, I’d witnessed a sacrifice that day at Chichen Itza. Somehow, I knew it had something to do with the National Geographic that was left on the delivery room nightstand." Mother's eyes grew wide and shiny as she continued.  "Right before your birth, I read an article about the temple's twice-yearly equinox and all the offerings."  

A few years later, I'd learn more about Postpartum Depression and mother's matrix of medications she’d needed to avoid an elongated hospital stay.  

Mother's eyes widened as she entered her own story, "Here at Chichen Itza, during the equinox, legend has it, the setting sun's shadows morph into serpents. It's here, at the top of the pyramid, that the god's command all the snakes to slither down the bloody steps."  

As mother refocused, she sucked in oxygen as if she was gasping and staring at all the intimate, horrible images.  "Once on the dirt, the shadows crawled off into the thick of the Yucatan forest. Since the day you were born, Massey, I dream of ruins."  

Her words were mercurial poison. Until her final breath, which I wasn't there for, mother had seen something reptilian in me. It showed in the slits of her hazel eyes anytime I was near. I felt there was something about my father's ability to love that disgusted her all those years. She often had said, I’d taken away her freedom somehow. 

I was barely a teenager when my mother died. After, father cleaved into a million emotional pieces, each shard, a jagged tight fit in his mosaic of a broken heart. Above all, his true grief demonstrated how much he truly loved her. I loved her too. I just didn't like her. Somehow father finished raising me. Everything just seemed easier. I was no longer someone's burden. 

I'd just turned seven when father went off to war.  

Father commanded a Challenger One Tank, in the first Gulf War. He was Saddam Hussein's worst nightmare, the quintessential American bull in a Middle-Eastern hourglass. Father's unit advanced, gutted Russian T-55's, rolled over ghostly obstacles all the way to Baghdad. After Iraq, he made sure his unit arrived home safely to raise one day daughters and sons in the homeland.  

I became one of those daughters.  

I'd discover one day, while father was away, mother dealt her tarot cards from the bottom of her custom, 78-card deck. Oh, how she loved the smooth Italian's, the well waxed Tarocco Piemontese brand of playing cards. Each clandestine relationship began and ended with a royal black heart. Nothing inside mother fulfilled her, and with time, all things changed around her.  

Ten years after father returned from the war, mother left Eddie the butcher, "for good," she’d said.  

Gone only a few years, she attempted to sell father an empty package of regrets. She said she was sorry, how much she wanted him back, and how it's never too late. But father's mind was set. Love doesn’t mean you have to bargain yourself away. 

Mother eventually died from reoccurring breast cancer, alone in a studio apartment hospice bed.  

After she passed, I finished high school, and went off to college, began a career, loved a husband, had two children, the usual sweet demands. Moving to the west coast made visits with father uniquely impossible. Time got away from us both. I'll be honest; everything got away from me, including a cheating husband. Everything went off the rails. The part of me in the center became a cored apple.  

But now that my kids are grown, I've moved back to Rochester, Minnesota, and not for any particular reason. I've gotten past forgiving myself, and for not forgiving Mother.  

I can't lie to you. I moved back home to rediscover what a simple man saw in a daughter who's lost her way. If I was taught anything, it was that I am strong and independent.  

I know in time, I will discover the person inside worth loving so much. And with more time, I hope to discover that truly loving a dead mother is never too late.  

 

About the author 

Dan’s poetry, fiction, and nonfiction have appeared in the Apple in the Dark, Aphelion, BlazeVOX, Bull, Cleaver, Coffin Bell, Door=Jar, Drunken Pen Writing, Entropy, Dark City Magazine, Gravel, Lowestoft Chronicles, Mystery Tribune, New Flash Fiction Review, Poetry Northwest, Spelk, Your Impossible Voice. Best of the Net Anthology Nomination, Coffin Bell, 2020