When the truck passed taking with it a throng of dancing people, the street returned to just being crowded with parade-goers milling about. As usual, the event was poorly paced.
With the truck up the street and the thump fading to a tap, Familiar said, This thing is always crazy, huh? I love Insurrection Day.
A day off from work is always good, I replied.
See, they got into your brain, Familiar said. Turned you against yourself. That's sort of like saying Christmas is just a day off in the middle of December.
He was right. That's what they call it, Cross River Christmas. All the businesses shutter and the kids go outside to play football and show each other what the ghost of Ol' Cigar brought them, until it's time to head down to the parade and then everyone goes out into the street, marching from the Northside to River Promenade on the Southside where they start the bonfire, eventually burning a straw version of Ol' Cigar's body, a true warrior's burial.
Naw, chief, he continued, it's more than that. It's gotta be. It's the kids running around with their faces painted and all the history and the bonfire….
Yeah, I replied. I remember the thrill I used to get as a kid marching down the street to that drum. You got me there. It gets old though.
I was taking pleasure in getting under his skin. He stared at me for a moment, twisting his face into true rage and puzzlement. He had wavy processed hair that he swept back into a little ponytail and his skin was smooth and as yellow as uncooked chicken fat.
People like you, young folks, think stories of The Great Insurrection are just some fairytales. It don't make you proud that even before your grandfather was born, Ol' Cigar and them ran away and killed some white folks and got away with it? They built this black paradise.
I'll give it to Familiar, he sounded sincere. Like an old Riverbaby, watching the town seal go up for the first time. He was full of shit, man, full of shit and I couldn't even tell.
All the statues in the world and Insurrection Day celebrations don't make it true, I said. At least not all the way true. I mean the dude, Ol' Cigar, was illiterate and like 85 years old at the time.
You talking like a crazy person, Familiar said. And I don't even think you believe it. Familiar paused. Hey man, you some sort of songwriter or something, man?
Naw man, I said, but I really wanted to say, Does it look like I'm writing a song? Then I thought, You know, with this damn stack of papers in my hand, it might actually look like I'm writing a song.
There was a silent moment and he said, I ask because I see your page says something about Phoenix Starr. You writing a movie script?
Umm, I replied, just like a history sort of, I guess. Not really though. Just some thoughts. A Cross River story, I guess. All I see, really.
On the top of page 25, I'd written lightly in pencil, Reveal Everything. I had no idea what this meant and didn't remember writing it.
I turned to my title page and stared. It said, Phoenix Rises: The Life, Death (Immolation) and (Re-Birth) Rise from the Ashes of Phoenix Starr, Lead Singer of the Phoenix Starr Trilogy and Cross River's Greatest Singer. This no longer fit. It only applied to an ever-shrinking section so I crossed that out and wrote, The Revelation of Everything, and that felt right.
Revelation of Everything, huh? People might not want you to reveal everything, he said and laughed. Someone should make a movie about him, he continued. I thought about it before. Could never work up the money though. It would start with a comet crashing into the Cross River and his parents are nearby, say at River Promenade making love. Then the next scene is him in high school and he gets into a fight and his teacher, this Native American or maybe an Asian like Mr. Miyagi, grabs him and says, You must not waste your powers young Phoenix. Then there's this montage of him running along the river, punching the air and learning to play the guitar and shit. Pretty good, huh?
Real original, I should have said, but I just smiled and lied: Sounds interesting.
He said his name and stuck out his hand and I forgot his name as soon as I grabbed his hand. I told him mine and regretted it.
I'm so proud of that dude for inventing Riverbeat, Familiar said. Nobody could scat like Phoenix Starr. Chief, his scatting was magical.
This man was a fool, Phoenix Starr didn't invent The Sound of Cross River. That was never in dispute. The guy just revolutionized it. Familiar was right about one thing, the guy's scatting was enchanting. I could listen to nothing, but him scatting all afternoon.
Familiar continued: …and the way the drummer did the doubling and the tripling …goddammit and how the bass player used to play the notes backward along with Phoenix's guitar…he wouldn't have been nothing without the Trilogy...I think I can hear that shit in my head now.
You going to the bonfire? Familiar asked me.
Yep.
I'm trying to see if my man is out there to sell me some smoke, I ain't heard from him all day. I don't know where he's at. I really want some reefer, man. I'd probably pay my whole salary for a bag.
I just nodded.
There was a buzzing in my pocket that I felt before I heard the sound: a song playing, an obscure Phoenix Starr song that, a minute before, had flitted through my mind. It's as if my fleeting thoughts of it were a harbinger. JANICE, flashed in blue-green letters across the face of the telephone. I felt a pang rise up from my ribcage and flood my mouth. It felt like fear, but I don't think it was. After all, what did I have to fear? Perhaps part of me was trying to tell me something. An involuntary smile passed across my lips and I felt mildly aroused. You can't always trust your body.
Though I wanted to talk to her, I didn't answer.
She was on my voicemail, Hey fool-face, she said. Her voice was light and sexy and playful, not at all how I expected it, Pick up the phone…you there?... Wait, why am I saying this on your voicemail?….anyway, I wanted to know if you're going to the celebration? OK, let me know. I'm heading there right now. Alright. Bye…
There was something in her voice, a cautious tone of insecurity as if she was wondering if she'd lost me forever. I liked this; much like ignoring her call, it gave me some power.
His phone went off, playing a song that I knew, but couldn't place and he opened it and started talking. For a moment I wondered why he had asked me the time, as I'm sure his phone could have told him. Then I stopped caring.
He closed his phone and looked at me.
My bird, he said, pointing to the phone.
What's that? I replied.
My bird, she's always calling at all times of day with a bunch of bullshit. He raised the pitch of his voice to a comical whine—Can you do this? Can you do that—Damn. They can nag you to death, can't they?
I was supposed to say something like, Ain't that the truth? or Don't I know it! But I didn't say anything like that. I didn't say anything, actually.
That's part of it though, he continued. I shouldn't complain. She's a good chick. You got a bird?
I nodded.
That's great man. Ain't nothing like a woman having your back. Maybe we can all get together. I'd love for you to meet my chick. I got a grill in my backyard. We can barbeque and drink beers….
He went on and on. I pictured Janice as he spoke. She had little fingers and a little nose, brown skin and a variety of smiles. In one amazing smile, my favorite one, she somehow obscured her big teeth and displayed just her top gums. She looked like a beautiful kid. There was a mole on her cheek that looked like a shooting star. It somehow added to her sophistication. Her hair was a mass of thick, undulating tresses that she most often wore in a burst of hanging locks that reminded me of exploding fireworks.
Too bad my work created a barrier between Janice and me. She crowned herself the Architect of Our Destruction for buying me that typewriter. I don't regret the typewriter, just that all this madness began with the typewriter. We saw it in the window of a pawn shop. It was the first Sunday of April and we had just finished strolling through Ol' Cigar Park where we marveled at the new pink blossoms. All the fresh life surrounding us had made me a bit sad about the dreariness of my life.
She leaned into my arm and asked, What's wrong?
Normally I'd try to explain, but words were never satisfactory; too limited as tools, but still the best thing I had. It reminded me of a poem I had written as a teenager so I recited it for her:
My mouth is a sea in which my tongue has drowned a thousand times.
That's trite, she said.
I know, I replied. Everything's trite.
As we strolled through the downtown streets and she pointed out all that was beautiful from the colorful vintage clothing in the window of a thrift shop to a lovely crack in the sidewalk. I replied with cynical comments until we got to the pawn shop. It was the ugliest building on the block, perhaps in all of Downtown, perhaps in all of Cross River. The thing was a little box with thick black bars and gaudy neon lighting in the windows. There through the glass was another ugly thing. This metallic black monster. It was boxy like the store that housed it. The word Royal was plastered across the top in gold letters.
When Janice yanked my arm to signal me to move on I said, Wait, hold up.
At the time, I'd just started writing things outside of work here and there, nothing too serious. Even after I got it, it took me several months to really start using it.
Imagine what's been written on that thing, I said.
Thank you notes and letters to the electric company, she replied.
Love letters and great works of art.
Doug, you are a romantic after all.
Whatever. Let's go.
We walked off and I didn't think about the typewriter again after that, except maybe once or twice.
It showed up on my birthday and at first it sat in its box and flitted through my mind infrequently. I looked at it and said often, I gotta start using that thing. All I did after work was come home and fall asleep. That old routine. Soon, I found a way off that treadmill, a way to change my life and later, I realized, all of life: my fingers moving across those keys. That beautiful clattering. That wonderful click-clacking. I became addicted to hearing it. The sound tapped through my head even when I wasn't typing. Janice thought I was going crazy. Maybe I was. Going crazy felt real and true.
Familiar was still talking when I snapped back into the conversation. I rubbed my brow in annoyance, but he didn't get the message and continued on. I looked at my broken watch again, for probably the tenth time that day, and the barely ticking hands irritated me. Every excuse I made to split sounded phony, so they didn't reach my lips. My pocket buzzed and, from below my waist, I heard a dead singer's voice scatting: Gotta get outta here. Break through to nowhere. Because even nowhere's gotta be better than here.
Escape Fantasy # 15, Familiar said, correctly identifying the song. The Phoenix Starr Trilogy's blatant rip-off of The Doors' Break on Through.
I frowned.
I hoped it was Janice on the phone, but it wasn't. When I answered the phone it was my friend, Koz, excitedly telling me about the number of women that were standing out on his street waiting for the parade to pass, except he called them bitches, which prompted me to call them bitches, though I wouldn't normally call them bitches, but I figured it was OK to call them bitches if I recognized intellectually that it was problematic to call them bitches.
After I closed my phone, Familiar and I sat side by side in an awkward silence.
So, I'm about to go meet up with my man, Koz, I said and there was a bit of silence.
You think he knows where I can get some herb? Familiar asked and I didn't say Yes, even though the answer was Yes. I was tired of his company and couldn't stand another moment with him. I stood and offered him my right hand and told him I had to run. He said he was headed in my direction and offered to follow along. I shrugged and he followed.
In one story, I'm a badass nigga. A thug. When the man points his gun at me, I turn my back to him and laugh absently. This throws him off. He's nervous and he keeps yelling, telling me to lie facedown with my hands on my head. He doesn't tell me he is a cop. Never shows me a badge or anything like that. He just stands there pointing his weapon. Even in the stories he never identifies himself.
I put a Newport at the corner of my mouth and light it, cupping my hand around the tip to protect the fire from the air.
What the fuck you want with me, huh? I say with the lit end of my fumi bobbing up and down. What business you got with me?
In real life, I don't even smoke Newports.
So anyway, I lunge at him and stab him up or I shoot him or something and he dies. It's a story that I could never dream up myself. I'm no thug. No one would mistake me for a tough guy. I'm short, somewhat stout and often I look down or just away. It's said that after bandits broke into Phoenix Starr's house and shot him three times, that he mixed himself a rum & coke and finished the joint he was smoking before the break-in and then called for an ambulance. I love that story and love Phoenix Starr, but I've never been that thugged-out.
I don't mind thinking of myself this way though. Who among the weak and powerless has never imagined himself a superhero? Actually, I take that back. I'm sorry I've caused so much suffering. This moment is the regret that makes midgets of all my other regrets.
Still, if I'm ever caught and locked away, this is how I'll tell the story. Survival, you know.
