Harnett-Hargrove

  

 

Cannons

It's an engine of creation. If it works, don’t fix it. If it’s broken, don’t fix it.

About three-thirty in the nighttime, I came across a makeshift temple with a handwritten sign. Anyone that trespasses will be recruited for earthy employ.

I had gotten use to the brevity of the after world: the hilarium, the tediousness, and the dull.

Hearing I was drafted, I did myself the favor of getting real drunk in the classic off-to-war style way before headed off. In training I learned I was to wear a white uniform sporting red diagrams. Not understanding if I was to be read as information or stand out as a target, and before I could ask what the — I was sent back — back to exact locations on earth leaving notes to mortals. The letters were pretty little things wrapped in rags explaining luck of ominous intent, timing, and farewell. The receivers where to recognize the import of the kismet, or not. 

……….

“Well then, how DO you work? I mean, in general.”

“Generally,” Kim answered honestly, “I agree to whatever the client likes, and then I go and do what I want to,” she rolled her eyes and shrugged, “You know, in general.”

 

They both climbed up on the tailgate and looked into the cooler. Kim discarded her thigh high lace-up sandals and rubbed at the tattoo marks left by the leather straps.

Les handed her lunch, and she immediately ripped open the hoagie and began digging through the sandwich to tossing out what she would not eat.

“I’ll take that,” he interrupted her arm in mid-air.

Ignoring a blinding shine winking a bit off in the distance, he tossed the pickle into his mouth and continued the thread he had been trying to get across. 

“Like I was saying, that Buick/Opel ’76 is an ugly car, I mean 2 for 1 ugly. Ahead-of-it’s-time ugly.” His mood was all pink and baby blue, teetering on the fun Sagittariun/Gemini nightmare that he embodied.

Tiring of this conversation she sang out, “Got it!” extending the vowels. “Don’t you just love the way the desert is so VERY quiet.”

He smirked and communed with the sandwich, his jaw popping.

……….

It is all happenstance without much insight. There were neither names nor address on the small bundles. I began to wonder if synchronicity came into play. Does it have a pause button? What happens when the receiver is not looking or listening? On altered planes? What is an altered level? Are all levels altered? Are these, too, synchronized? Interesting questions without practical experience. I was back puffing and theorizing, walking the halls of middle school. The problem with this job, is too much time to think. Better to dwell on those impossible koans instead of the thwart factor. I set again to working fast in the dimensions and under conditions they gave me, sprinkling notes across a vast area. I Hurried to get finished, but also felt dread in getting back to home base.

……….

Thinking of nothing in particular but hoping for a thought to catch hold, Les hummed Canon alla Ottava slowly, a short fugue he had known since he was 7 years old. His fingers absent-mindedly moved to hit cords on an invisible harpsichord.

Kim was reminded of her earlier chapters, processing her life in five minutes the way brains do because they can. It read like a Herman Hesse novel, edited with a multitude of breakfasts and trips to the bathroom. She could count her life throwing curves at the right time — but there was always the whiff of anxiety just before a shift. The doubting that something will fall into her lap, just before something falls in her lap.

A piece of trash looking strangely like a rag spat out of no-where on no-wind and gently settled on red metal, looking like a burned paper scrap from a far off fire.

“Why DO you like the desert?”

“Well,” she simplified, “It’s a large blank canvas to me.”

He imagined a pressure cooker and arranged another smirk. Picking up on this mental image she added,

 “Okay, a hot canvas. Something will happen. The white screen will in time burst and reveal something you didn’t imagine.”

“You’re are scaring me.” Les mocked, “Anita, white is for babies.”  

He loved her, but loved to tease her more, keeping her from spinning out completely. Her triple Scorpio nature always lurked.

Kim palmed her chin and splayed her fingers, “Ha! You came with your mouth open. It’s immaterial. But it’s usually something cool, nothing scary about it.”

“Touché.”

……….

Delivering fate is like connecting the dots. A shattering and replacing of stars, to become an aerial view of a city map of manhole covers. Bright circles of the primary colored twister game connecting dot-to-dots. Of the 101 delusions maybe there’s only one copied over and over. This was all beyond my threshold of adventure. Mars in Cancer. But, who would be brave enough to say so? Not me.

……….

Les fell to patient waiting for the wide white screen to crack open with the missing piece. Patiently waiting for Kim to find a Godot.

“Ever feel like you’re looking for gold in a copper mine?” he offered. They both looked out, their gaze following a meandering gully left by a recent flash flood.

A yellow balloon drifted past them high up in the atmosphere along an escape route from an amusement park 74 miles away.

After another long pause, Kim seceded the campaign.

“Okay, let s get going, I’m not finding what I came here for.”

Jumping down, she stretched sideways with her hands on her head. She followed him into the truck.

“And, on the way back please, don’t desecrate Motown.” The engine cranked over and the stick pushed into first.

He raised an eyebrow, “Didn’t I show you my hall-pass?”

She was in control of the wheels as they spun a u-turn. Peeling away, what looked to be a delicate rag flew off the top of the red cab.

-30-