that’s when.”
“The blow returned your sight?”
“For half a minute, a little less than that. I saw the girl clear as my sister. And I got a quick glimpse of the dude’s face too.”
“Any glimmers since then?”
“No,” Sovereign James said. “No. I called the girl near about two thirty this morning.”
“Pretty early, isn’t it?”
“That’s when my day’s been starting lately. Wake up in the dark and stay that way and time begins to have less meaning.”
When you get old enough
, Eagle James had told his grandson,
the rules that once was just don’t seem to matter no more. Old man says what he wants to do, and who’s gonna tell him no when I keep a pistol under the blanket in my wheelchair?
Sovereign pushed Eagle’s wheelchair wherever the old man wanted to go. The eighty-year-old Kansan was heavy and so was the steel chair, but the boy loved his grandfather and didn’t want anybody else to ferry him around.
Not that anyone else wanted to.
They cruised the block, went shopping for his mother, and made secret excursions to the liquor store, where Eagle would buy P&M whiskey by the half pint. On weekends they went on longer expeditions.
“What are you thinking about, Mr. James?” Seth Offeran asked.
“That ochre dress that Toni Loam was wearing. She’s a young woman, maybe ten pounds less than she should be. Plain at first look but in hindsight there was a prettiness to her cheeks and eyes.”
“Are you going to see her?”
“That’s a funny question, Doctor. I’d like to see her. I’d give everything I have just to see that yellow dress again. But I’ll have to make do with a hello and a handshake.”
“I think it might be good for you to spend some time with this woman,” the psychiatrist offered. “She’s the only thing you’ve seen since your sight shut off.”
“You make it sound like a faucet.”
“Yes, I did.”
“Like I turned it off on purpose.”
“Have you ever seen anything so horrendous that it made you shut your eyes so hard you thought that they might never open again?”
“No, can’t say that I have.”
He was walking down a long lane leading to the beach. It was a sultry afternoon and summer, so the sun was hot and the asphalt heated through his flip-flop rubber thongs until it felt as if they might melt. The path curved and he was carrying a cold can of root beer that his grandfather had given him twenty-five cents to buy. They drank from the same pop-top can when they were alone and Winifred wasn’t there to stop them.
The shadows were long and the air was beginning to cool. Soon he’d push the wheelchair to the edge of the parking lot and use the pay phone to call his mother to come get them.
A dozen seagulls burst suddenly into the air and wheeled high toward the sky. Something had frightened them.
Eagle James’s chair was turned away from the water. That was odd. He was slumped over and a red ribbon ran down from his nose and across the blue workshirt that he wore every day. If Winifred wanted to wash that shirt she had to do it after he went to sleep and get it back in his bureau before he woke up in the morning.
The ribbon was glistening like it was made from nylon or fancy Chinese silk, like it was wet. And Eagle was winking but steadily, not opening his left eye and smiling as he usually did.
It wasn’t until he called and Eagle didn’t respond that Sovereign realized there was something wrong. Then he saw the pistol on the ground in front of the wheelchair and he remembered Eagle saying,
Never let ’em count you out, boy. If they comin’ to get ya and you know there’s no way out, there’s still a way
. And then he’d hold his thumb and point finger like the muzzle of a pistol up his nose. When the thumb came down Sovereign would close his eyes.
The buzzer to his apartment was mild but insistent. Sovereign woke up realizing that his dream was the answer to Offeran’s question.
“Hello?” he said into the intercom
“The blow returned your sight?”
“For half a minute, a little less than that. I saw the girl clear as my sister. And I got a quick glimpse of the dude’s face too.”
“Any glimmers since then?”
“No,” Sovereign James said. “No. I called the girl near about two thirty this morning.”
“Pretty early, isn’t it?”
“That’s when my day’s been starting lately. Wake up in the dark and stay that way and time begins to have less meaning.”
When you get old enough
, Eagle James had told his grandson,
the rules that once was just don’t seem to matter no more. Old man says what he wants to do, and who’s gonna tell him no when I keep a pistol under the blanket in my wheelchair?
Sovereign pushed Eagle’s wheelchair wherever the old man wanted to go. The eighty-year-old Kansan was heavy and so was the steel chair, but the boy loved his grandfather and didn’t want anybody else to ferry him around.
Not that anyone else wanted to.
They cruised the block, went shopping for his mother, and made secret excursions to the liquor store, where Eagle would buy P&M whiskey by the half pint. On weekends they went on longer expeditions.
“What are you thinking about, Mr. James?” Seth Offeran asked.
“That ochre dress that Toni Loam was wearing. She’s a young woman, maybe ten pounds less than she should be. Plain at first look but in hindsight there was a prettiness to her cheeks and eyes.”
“Are you going to see her?”
“That’s a funny question, Doctor. I’d like to see her. I’d give everything I have just to see that yellow dress again. But I’ll have to make do with a hello and a handshake.”
“I think it might be good for you to spend some time with this woman,” the psychiatrist offered. “She’s the only thing you’ve seen since your sight shut off.”
“You make it sound like a faucet.”
“Yes, I did.”
“Like I turned it off on purpose.”
“Have you ever seen anything so horrendous that it made you shut your eyes so hard you thought that they might never open again?”
“No, can’t say that I have.”
He was walking down a long lane leading to the beach. It was a sultry afternoon and summer, so the sun was hot and the asphalt heated through his flip-flop rubber thongs until it felt as if they might melt. The path curved and he was carrying a cold can of root beer that his grandfather had given him twenty-five cents to buy. They drank from the same pop-top can when they were alone and Winifred wasn’t there to stop them.
The shadows were long and the air was beginning to cool. Soon he’d push the wheelchair to the edge of the parking lot and use the pay phone to call his mother to come get them.
A dozen seagulls burst suddenly into the air and wheeled high toward the sky. Something had frightened them.
Eagle James’s chair was turned away from the water. That was odd. He was slumped over and a red ribbon ran down from his nose and across the blue workshirt that he wore every day. If Winifred wanted to wash that shirt she had to do it after he went to sleep and get it back in his bureau before he woke up in the morning.
The ribbon was glistening like it was made from nylon or fancy Chinese silk, like it was wet. And Eagle was winking but steadily, not opening his left eye and smiling as he usually did.
It wasn’t until he called and Eagle didn’t respond that Sovereign realized there was something wrong. Then he saw the pistol on the ground in front of the wheelchair and he remembered Eagle saying,
Never let ’em count you out, boy. If they comin’ to get ya and you know there’s no way out, there’s still a way
. And then he’d hold his thumb and point finger like the muzzle of a pistol up his nose. When the thumb came down Sovereign would close his eyes.
The buzzer to his apartment was mild but insistent. Sovereign woke up realizing that his dream was the answer to Offeran’s question.
“Hello?” he said into the intercom
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