c. 2025 Rod Ice
All rights reserved
(5-25)
Living at Evergreen Estates for more than two decades had changed Townshend Carr Lincoln from a productive, successful member of society, to something else. A darker, more reclusive figure, colored in the mournful hues of a burned-out building. He had been drunk for successive days that defied being numbered. Only through that conduit of oblivion had he been able to survive in such an environment. Poverty and alienation were his companions. The joy of seeing a sunrise, once a blessed event celebrated every day, was gone. In its place, there stood a phantom of bleak endurance. A figure bent and twisted, and turned by fire into smoke and ash. That was what he saw in the mirror, when a new cycle of light and life began, each morning.
Oddly, when filtered through a haze of bourbon, this meager existence actually felt comfortable.
While sitting on the front porch, a three-sided space stuck halfway down one vinyl-sided wall of his mobile home, he reflected on a comic routine by Rodney Dangerfield. One of his lost heroes. The words caused him to chill slightly, despite seasonal conditions that were notably humid and hot.
He could feel the weight of this missive, lingering on his heart like a stone.
“My life is nothing but pressure. All pressure. This pressure is like a heaviness. It’s always on top of me, this heaviness. It’s always there since I’m a kid. Other people wake up in the morning, ‘A new day! Ah, up and at ‘em!’ I wake up, the heaviness is waiting for me nice. Sometimes I even talk to it. I say ‘Hi heaviness!’ and the heaviness looks back at me, ‘Today you’re gonna get it good. You’ll be drinking early today!’”
Disability had caused him to stoop over, in the manner of a withered tree. His limbs were numb and stiff. His walking pace, deliberate and cautious. His eyesight was fading, to the point that details were difficult to discern. Yet he rarely ventured away from his trailer abode, except to buy more beverage alcohol, snack foods, and get rations of prescription pills to keep his blood pressure in check, and his heart from exploding. Otherwise, he was content to sit alone, grumbling and cursing.
Only through the noise of an occasional belch, or coughing fit, could any of his neighbors be sure that death had not already claimed him where he sat, in a merciful act of finality.
Originally, the management team on-site kept watch over their anonymous resident, as a matter of course. But with a paring back of resources, to make the park more efficient and streamlined, he low languished in a netherworld of his own. Days and weeks would pass, with no visitors or communication. Only the brief wave of a sympathetic driver, while passing, offered any sign that his presence had been noticed.
Piercing this social vacuum, a lone voice squawked in his ear. Darby Stronelli, a fellow citizen on his eastern flank, could not stay far away. She would tinker in the yard and rearrange piles of concrete blocks and scrap lumber, until finally, curiosity caused her to butt in where she had not been invited.
With spiky hair and soiled, work clothes, she paused at the foot of his access ramp, and offered a shrill greeting of sorts.
“HEY BUDDY! I SEE YOU UP THERE! AND I DO! YOU GOT YER BOTTLE LIKE ALWAYS! DAMNN, I SHOULD GET A BUD LIGHT AND JOIN YOU FOR A MINUTE!”
Lincoln felt his stomach churn.
“Join me? Please don’t...”
His cohort across the empty lot giggled and guffawed as if a joke had been repeated.
“NAHH, C’MON NOW, I KNOW BETTER THAN THAT! NOBODY LIKES TO BE ALONE, IT REALLY SUCKS WHEN I DON’T GET TO SEE MY FRIENDS. ESPECIALLY IN THE SUMMER, I WANNA DRINK AND PLAY HORSESHOES OR CORNHOLE, AND HAVE A GOOD TIME!”
The hermitic loner shrugged and groaned before taking a swallow from his bottle.
“A good time is when nobody breaks the silence over here...”
Once again, his neighbor cackled as if some amusing observation had been offered.
“HAHAHAH! I GET IT! THAT’S FUNNY AS FUCK, DUDE! YER A DAMN CLOWN, LINK! SHIT HOW LONG HAS IT BEEN SINCE YA GOT A HAIRCUT? YOU LOOK LIKE FREAKING GRIZZLY ADAMS!”
Lincoln sighed heavily. He needed to be more inebriated to bear having a real conversation.
“I’ll take that as a compliment. I liked Grizzly Adams...”
Darby slapped the sides of her legs, and hissed. Suddenly, the tone of her voice changed completely.
“I WANTED TO ASK WHAT YA THINK OF THIS NEW PLAN BY THE PARK OWNERS. AIN’T IT A BITE IN THE ASS? NO MORE MANAGERS, NO MORE MAINTENANCE GUY, NOBODY AT THE OFFICE, JUST A PHONE NUMBER AND AN E-MAIL ADDRESS! WHAT THE HELL IS THAT?”
Her fellow resident shook his head with disinterest.
“When we had someone to hear us bitch, did it do any good?”
The skinny, street-hustler clenched her fists.
“NO DAMMIT! IT NEVER DID! YOU KNOW THAT, LINK!”
He shrugged again, and scratched his shaggy beard.
“So then, what difference does it make if they pay somebody to sit up there in the office? We basically get a middle finger, one way or another...”
Darby choked and spat on the ground.
“NO, NO, NO! THAT’S HORSESHIT, MAN! THEY CAN’T JUST LEAVE OUR BUTTS HANGING OUT! SOMEODY HAS TA TAKE CARE OF THIS PLACE! SOMEBODY HAS TA GIVE A SHIT!”
Lincoln smiled with a grimace of futility hardening his features.
“Do they? Look around, this is a junkyard. Rusty cars and trucks, wood pallets, old fences, crumbling streets, you’d think this property had been abandoned...”
The nosey instigator jumped up and down in his gravel driveway.
“NO, NO, NO! YOU GOTTA CARE, BUDDY! YOU GOTTA CARE ABOUT THIS PLACE, ‘CAUSE IT’S WHERE WE LIVE! THIS IS HOME, OUR HOME SWEET HOME!”
The cranky iconoclast narrowed his eyes.
“Not too sweet, I’d say. More like a sour lemon that spoiled...”
Finally, the patience of his visiting neighbor had run dry. She kicked rocks in the driveway, and snorted with defiance.
“THAT’S IT, OLD FART! GO FUCK YOURSELF! I’M DONE TRYING TO KEEP IN TOUCH! FUCK YOUUUUU!”
After she had disappeared around the front corner of his trailer, Lincoln bowed his head, as if saying a prayer.
“Thank you, Jesus. Thank you, Lord! Now it’s just me and the heaviness... and this bottle of brown liquor!”
No comments:
Post a Comment