The Fire Hydrant

“What has gotten into you Jonathan?”
It was the voice of his mother. He didn’t have to look up to see the deep lines of worry etched in her pink forehead, or the downturned pale lips that seemed to tremble while waiting for an answer that would never come. He could picture her hands on her hips, the gold band of her wedding ring glinting in the sun, her gray-blue eyes darting back and forth from the neighbor’s house to him, and then up once again, scanning the cul-de-sac for curious eyes and sneaky glances.
He lay on his stomach above the sidewalk, the cold cement had worked its way through his clothes, and now the cool hand acted like an anchor despite the wind of worry beginning to blow.
He let her sounds float over him, drifting away like a bad smell. And when it cleared, he took a deep breath and renewed his attention on the fire hydrant towering over him. He had been sprawled on the sidewalk in front of his mother’s house for nearly two hours, taking photo after photo of the worn yellow hydrant. After each click of the camera he saw something new, a spider web, a crack, a spot of rust. And as he looked, he went deeper and deeper, seeing variations in color he had not seen before. It kept going and going. He had walked out of the door just to take a simple picture, but the hydrant was a door, and the moment he looked at it, the world opened and he could not look away. There was more to see, so much more. He could feel the chains of earth calling, it was a voice he recognized.
“Jonathan?”
He had been in a frenzy over the past week, that’s what she called it. He would take photos throughout the family’s house until the camera’s battery died, then he would plug it into the wall and while it charged, eat like a voracious animal. After the meal he would crash on the nearest padded piece of furniture, the couch in the living room, the easy chair in the dining room, or in his bed if the family’s large German shepherd had not already claimed it. His mother had begun to worry about him. She had never seen him like this. He had always been a creative boy, painting and writing and making things out of clay, but he always did it in his spare time, after classes or on the weekend, not for hours and hours, letting his cycle of sleep revolve around the battery instead of the moon. Something had snapped or changed and she was not sure why or how, but it worried her. There didn’t seem to be anything else in his life, just photos, just the camera.
She stood next to him on the sidewalk in her slippers and bathrobe. She looked around nervously, wondering if the neighbors could see them through their curtains. She hoped not, there would be little she could do to prevent the rumors from starting.
“Do you hear me Jonathan? What has gotten into you? Laying on the sidewalk, out here in the cold for hours, what could be so interesting about the hydrant?” She looked at his subject with a critical eye. It was yellow, but with cracks on the sides and rust along the edges, but it was a hydrant, and if he had not been out here, she would have never given it more than a second of her time, she never had before.
“I’m worried about you.”
He did not look up. Now he was only vaguely aware of her presence beside him, and it came only from the dull nagging sensation pulling on his skin, making it just a little more difficult to work, just a little harder to find new angles and cobwebs and worlds. He would not respond, he knew words would do little to appease her. He knew it did look strange, he was strange, but he could not stop. There were doors, there were angles, there was eternity to capture.

At The Lake

The lake was glimmering in the sparkles of a late afternoon sun. An airplane coming out of San Francisco airport soundlessly rose towards the clouds above, the sounds of its engines drowned by the distance and the ceaseless flow of cars that surrounded all sides of the lake like a metallic river of spasms, noise and velocity that came and went endlessly. She parked her car on the small parking lot just on the banks of the lake, only a small path of pine trees and wood chips separated her from the water. Stepping out of the car, she entered the small liquid island of flora in the city of asphalt and endless motion. There was the warm aroma of softly baked pine needles that had dropped and mingled with the wood chips on the ground. A cement bench, donated in loving memory of Rick, was warm from a day in the sun, un-corroded by the elements of wind and rain and heat and fog that was thick and unrelenting in this part of the city. She watched an Asian man approach from the bottom of a small hill in short black running shorts. His hair was short and black and buzzed and reminded her of a military man. He had just finished an intense run around the lake, his shirt was wet, only small patches of light gray insinuated the original color of the dry garment. The length of the shorts struck her, it was not a length most American men were comfortable with, they showed too much thigh. He looked around the lake, his hands on his hips. He watched the other people still running, in lycra and baseball hats and thick sneakers. None of them had yet broken a sweat. He had the look of a relaxed man, a man who had earned his moment of rest and reflection. He saw the girl taking pictures, sometimes he turned his head spontaneously and her black camera lens pointed at him. He would then turn around and look at the water and then turn and watch other runners passing by. There was the camera again. He ducked behind a 15ft high marble statue of a penguin, a thick and modernist interpretation of the animal. He hid from her line of sight. The girl began to walk slowly, peering around the statue to see him only a couple feet off the ground, using the incline of the statue as a place to put his hands while the rest of him went up and down in a series of pushups. His back was perfectly straight, a perfectly executed exercise. She watched his as she walked, wanting a photo but passing by without clicking the button. She had enough for one day.

Argument and Counter Argument

A middle aged woman walked through a great green park on a sunny afternoon. Two teenage boys walked by her side. One of the boys was her son. The other was her son’s best friend. The woman had a warm face, already etched with the wrinkles and spots that signaled a quickly approaching seniority. She wore dark glasses to protect her eyes from the harsh sunlight. Her hair was curly and brown and the unruly curls reached down to her neck. She wore a wrinkled loose button up shirt over a red T-shirt and she had a black bag around her shoulders which hung from her left side. She was thick around the middle and her light brown pants hung loose around her legs.
The boy that was her son was only a little thicker than her and he was also taller. He had messy black hair that partially covered his forehead. He had strong dark eyes and a slim pointed nose. He wore a red T-shirt with a logo on it and light gray cargo pants. He walked decisively, with a sense of pointed determination. Although they all walked together, he seemed to always be just a fraction of a step ahead.
The best friend was skinnier than his two companions, his entire body seemed to be made out of a softer substance. He had long blonde hair that was parted in the middle and tied together in the back. He wore a loose long sleeved brown shirt over a white T-shirt and black jeans. His left hand was always in his pants pocket, as if looking for a solid foundation in the darkness of his jeans.
They walked together by a small playground where many children were playing, screaming and laughing as they ran into each other and climbed up, and jumped over, the complex and colorful structures that stood over a small circle of rubber mulch. Several women, the mothers of the children, sat close by on green benches, looking at their children playing and turning to each other to find an ear or a temporary source of disposable entertainment. The middle aged woman looked towards them and remembered seating like that, in one of those very same benches, while her son ran through the little tunnels and slid down the metal ramps. She looked towards her son, trying to ascertain that this big strong boy was indeed the same little thing that had run up to her one day crying, suffering from a tiny cut on his knee. Her son at that moment was not looking towards the playground or towards her. His attention was on his best friend.
"The thing is… look, I understand that the levels are important, there’s no question about that…"
"Well, then what is the…?" the friend answered with a very subtle shrug of the shoulders.
"Wait, the thing is that the levels are important and all… but they are not the only thing that is important."
"I understand that but…"
"But wait… we agree that the levels are important but if you focus only on that then the game…"
"Well, I never said that I only focus on that. I don’t want to…"
"I’m not saying you did… it’s that…"
They walked together towards a dark tunnel. A bride and groom, in full wedding attire, were walking out of the darkness. The bride had an angry look on her face and there were small trails of mud on her wedding dress. A photographer followed behind them, carrying two large leather bags. The middle aged woman looked at them and remembered the days when she believed in marriage, when for a moment her lover was all that mattered and nothing could be more delicious or more desirable than to be in his presence, to be close to him and to touch his face, his body. It was all so brief and his son was all that was left of that short flirtation with romantic happiness. She wondered what this bride would think a year from now, a decade from now, maybe even a week from now. Would she still love her husband as she did on this sunny day? She shook her head and the trio entered the tunnel together. As her eyes adjusted to the darkness, she could make out the form of a homeless man leaning against a wall.
"What I’m really saying…" the friend continued as he only barely noticed the tunnel around him, "is that we have to keep in mind the effect that each session has on…"
"That’s exactly what I mean… if you do that…" the son said in a loud voice that echoed through the tunnel. A little boy screamed from the direction of the playground. At this distance, it was impossible to tell if it was a scream of delight or of horror. "If you do that, then the game becomes about levels…"
"I don’t want it to become about levels, you know… but…"
"But that’s the thing, it does… look at the second table of powers and tell me that if you focus on that then you don’t…"
"No, I wouldn’t base it on the second table… it would be too limiting…"
"But then what would be left?"
They emerged from the tunnel and the sunlight seemed brighter than ever. The woman leaned her head back to feel the warmth spreading over her face and body. Above them was a light brown ledge of rough cement and beyond the ledge there was a large black sculpture. She couldn’t make out the details, but it was shining black in the sunlight and some people were gathered around it. A man stepped close to the ledge with a camera in his hands and took a picture. She briefly wondered what he had taken a picture of.
"There is plenty left… look that’s only the second table… what if you look at the fifth table? There’s a lot there that can be a guide…"
"You can’t base the whole game on the fifth table!"
"I’m not saying you should… I just mean that…"
The woman looked at her son again. His face was blushed with a rush of anger. His friend looked up at him, with the eyes of gentle shyness he had always had. He would never take the fight too far but he would never quite give in. She wondered if that was the nature of real friendship. Maybe she had never had a real friend on which to try it. Maybe she couldn’t do what her son’s friend did. Maybe friendship itself depended on that subtle skill and she never had it and so her son would never have it and he was just lucky to have found someone who did. She looked at them as they walked down the cement path that lead towards another tunnel and she felt grateful for her son and for his friend and for their discussion that she simply couldn’t understand. She felt the warmth of the sun again like a bucket of hot water pouring over her dry face and she realized that today she was satisfied. For all that was lost and for all that she never found, today, on this sunny gentle afternoon, all her real needs were fulfilled.

The Illusion of Bliss

The photographer pointed towards the dark open mouth of the tunnel and started walking faster. The bride followed, picking up the long tail of her shiny white wedding gown with both hands, trying to avoid the grass and the dirt and the mud that threatened to soil it. The groom followed, imposing in his rented black tuxedo. He was a tall, thick man with closely cropped hair that revealed a big white head in the shape of an egg. His eyes were pressed together, trying to avoid the sunlight, and his hands were restless, fixing a button on the tuxedo now and then. The bride was also a thick woman, shorter than the groom. Her arms were fat strong pink pillars that glowed with color in contrast with the white gown. She wore high heels under the thick layers of white fabric and they clicked and clacked as they walked down the paved path towards the tunnel. The photographer, who was ten feet ahead of them, was wearing jeans and a crumpled brown jacket. His black hair was unruly and greasy, and some strands of it clung to his forehead. He carried a black tripod and several large cameras were hanging from his neck.
"Over here… just follow me… this is the perfect spot…"
The bride turned to the groom and frowned as she whispered: "I hope so… because my gown is about to be ruined…"
The groom shrugged and pointed to his shiny black shoes. "This is all rented you know. We’ll have to pay extra if we bring it back dirty…"
She shook her head, as if the comparison was ludicrous. "I’m talking about my gown… whatever… let’s just go and take the picture…"
The photographer stepped into the dark tunnel and for a moment the shadows closed in around him. There was a homeless man leaning against the curved inside walls, staring up at him with eyes of vague hope.
"Spare some change?" the dirty man on the floor said, barely raising his hand in a demonstration of low expectations.
The photographer shook his head and kept on walking. Inside the tunnel, it was very dark and there was a strong smell of urine and mold that permeated the walls and the floor. At points, the ground seemed slippery with fresh mud and he hoped the bride would not slip on the tricky surface. At least not before his job was done. At the end of the tunnel, the sun was shining brightly and the light seeped inside like a shower of golden rays brightly caressing dark opaque clouds of green haze. The photographer approached this entrance and started to set up his tripod. He had done this many times before. He had heard about this spot from other photographers. It was a place he would have missed if he didn’t know the park well. Behind him, the bride was making her way through the darkness of the tunnel.
"Spare some change?" the homeless man said again, looking up at the frowning woman with the long gown in her hands. The bride just looked away, avoiding the hobo’s eyes, as if that mere contact could get her dirty in some way she couldn’t describe. She felt the slippery mud under her heels and walked more slowly. Without turning, she called to the groom:
"Be careful in here… there’s mud… I don’t know what we’re doing here…"
The groom, who was right behind her, also ignored the homeless man who didn’t even bother to raise his hand this time.
"Well… he claims it’s the perfect spot…" and a smirk flashed across his face. Then his foot slid across the moldy moisture and he just barely managed to remain upright. He stepped faster towards his bride and put his right hand on her naked shoulder. "We really have to be careful here…"
"I know… that’s what I’m saying…"
Once again, they both almost slipped and managed to stay standing by holding on to each other. The photographer called to them just then.
"We’re almost done… come and stand in front of the entrance… right here…"
The photographer stood close to the open half circle of light and mimicked the position he wanted the groom to take, with his back towards the wall and his eyes looking to his bride before him. The groom understood the instruction and went to find his place. Here the floor was drier and it was not so difficult to maintain his footing. Still he walked slowly. He turned his back to the wall and faced his bride who looked up at him, still holding the tail of the gown in her hands.
"You’re gonna have to let go of that…" the photographer said, "just let it flow behind you…it will look really beautiful in this light."
The bride hesitated for a moment, then opened her hands and arms and the gown dropped behind her. The photographer walked over and pulled the tail back, creating a curve that flowed towards the muddy floor.
"Hold each others’ hands…"
"Now we’re getting really romantic…" the smirk crossed the groom’s face once again as he reached up to hold his bride’s hands.
"Shut up…" she said with the frown that had never left her face. She could smell the strong stench of urine all around him and she tried to breath as little as possible.
The groom held both her hands in his and looked towards the photographer. "Like this?"
The photographer looked through his lens at the portrait that was slowly forming before him. "Yeah, almost right… let me just get the light here…" He set up a small light behind him quickly and turned it on. Then he came back to his camera and looked through the lens again.
"Ok, almost right… now just look at each other…"
The groom smirked once again and the bride looked at him with impatience.
"You’re both in the right position… just relax your faces… look up at him, with eyes of admiration…"
"Yeah right…" she said and the groom giggled slightly.
"Just do it… for a moment… it’s a single moment that will last forever… look at him… remember how much you love him… look at him with that love… right now…and you, look at her with all the tenderness that you feel for her…"
The groom looked down at her and his eyes softened and she looked up at him and her eyes widened. And just as she saw something strange in his pupils, something that maybe she had never seen before, the flash went off and there was a loud click that echoed through the tunnel.
A voice came from the other side, a rough raspy voice soaked in bad alcohol: "Yeah… look at him…like you love him…"
The photographer clicked once, twice and one more time. "Keep it up… just a little longer… you’ll be glad that you did…"
She shuddered and looked at him again but the strangeness was gone. He was upset about the homeless man talking. He wanted to do something.
"One more and we’re done!" there was one more click and then the photographer sighed loudly. "That’s it! We got some good ones."
The bride released her groom’s hands immediately. He stepped back and turned towards the homeless man. The bride placed her hand on his shoulder and whispered: "Let it go… now’s not the time…just let it go, you will ruin everything…"
He shrugged his shoulders once again and waited while the photographer put away his equipment.
The old raspy voice came from the dark entrails of the tunnel once again: "To happiness. To bliss!" The groom turned towards the darkness but the voice was lost in the shadows. The bride examined her gown for any signs of mud or dirt. The photographer methodically folded his tripod while making calculations in his head.
"Let’s get out of here…" the groom said, trying to avoid breathing as they started to walk back from where they came. The bride’s heels clicked and clacked as they once again walked through the slippery dark tunnel. "To the happy couple…" the hobo whispered as they passed, sipping the last drop of whiskey from his metal flask. Soon it would be time for him to make his way back out into the world once again. For now, the tunnel was cool and it kept him away from the sunlight. For now, that was all he really needed.

The Couple Holding Hands

The woman walked out of the museum first, with a steady movement that clearly embodied confidence. She had black hair, long enough to barely touch her shoulders and fall in soft curves around her cheeks. She was wearing small glasses and her face was hard, as if the skin had ossified into permanent features that now would hardly move at all. She wore a long white shirt and blue jeans. She walked with the decisive manner of a soldier and her mouth was pressed together into the promise of a frown. She turned around to look at her boyfriend as he crossed the glass doorway and stepped out into the sunlit sidewalk. He was taller than her, thin and wiry. His hair was also black but cut much shorter. His eyes had a sense of calm that bordered on sleepiness. He wore a long brown T-shirt and blue jeans like hers. He walked toward the woman nodding, as if to say without words: ‘Now, that’s done.’ After him came her friend, a younger woman in a flowery dress and medium heels. She held a camera in her hand and she walked towards them with an enthusiastic grin drawn from cheek to cheek. The three of them came together at the top of the stairs and then walked down the gray cement steps. The boyfriend looked over towards the wide open plaza, covered in thin little trees and the sound of kids playing and birds singing. The woman looked straight towards the sidewalk instead, ready to move on. The friend smiled some more and looked towards a dark sculpture that stood in the middle of the lawn that surrounded the museum.
"Look at that… what is that?"
The sculpture had the shape of a black inverted funnel. The surface was shiny and polished, making a deep contrast with the grass and the gray sidewalk around it. The inverted funnel was covered with little angels, cherubim, who climbed up the slippery surface and over each other, trying to reach the top. Each of the angels was different and each made its effort in a particular and distinct way. Some were falling backwards, some were almost reaching their goal. The friend walked ahead of the couple and examined the sculpture carefully, even running her fingers over the angelic bodies, trying to feel their struggle through her hands.
"Look… they’re angels… they’re climbing and climbing…"
The man nodded and the woman looked at her friend and at her boyfriend with a sense of growing impatience.
"Well… we should be going back and…" she said, trying to sound as if it meant nothing, as if anything that happened would be fine with her, but she was unable to betray a bit of annoyance, a touch of cold impatience at the edges of her words.
"Just a second… I want to take a picture of the two of you… right here… in front of the sculpture."
The woman looked at her boyfriend, looking to see how he would react. He shrugged his shoulders and his eyes looked more sleepy than ever. Then, in a voice that was barely loud enough to be heard, he said:
"Sure… why not?"
The friend, lifting the camera to her eyes, looked at the woman and nodded towards the large black funnel that rose up from the green grass. "Well?"
The woman shrugged her shoulders like her boyfriend had and said: "I guess it’s ok…let’s just do it quickly."
The two of them walked towards the sculpture, which rose to three times their height. They stood in front of it, about a feet apart, waiting for the friend to take the picture. The friend made a gesture with her free hand and said:
"Closer you guys! You have to get closer!"
She stepped back slightly, trying to make sure she got them both into the picture as well as the dark shiny figure that rose behind them. The woman stepped closer to her boyfriend and he stepped a bit closer to her, without looking at each other. Their shoulders bumped together awkwardly and they both looked towards the friend, who was still getting ready to take the photo.
"Well? Go ahead and take it!" the woman said, feeling her boyfriend’s shoulder against her own.
"Just a second…" the friend said, and she stepped a bit farther back. "I think I got it… but you guys need to smile more… why don’t you hold hands?"The boyfriend sighed lightly and the woman couldn’t stop a burst of nervous laughter.
"Just take the picture!" She looked sideways at her boyfriend whose eyes were squinting against the sun.
"I want you to hold hands. It will look much better that way!"
Again a burst of nervous laughter came from the woman’s lips. She turned towards her boyfriend who was still just squinting into the sun and she grabbed his hand in hers and pulled both their hands, now pressed together, in front of them.
"There! You happy?" her voice dripping with a forced nonchalance.
The friend shook her head. "No, it doesn’t look right. You both still seem very awkward…. Like something’s wrong. It will come through clearly in the picture."
The woman tried to press closer to the boyfriend, feeling the tight muscles of his left arm against her shoulder. She rearranged the hands again and she smiled towards the camera. The boyfriend just stared ahead.
"You have to smile too!", the friend said to the boyfriend.
"C’mon! Just take the picture!" the woman said, feeling that there truly was something wrong but completely unsure of how to fix it.
The boyfriend turned to her then, looking steadily into her eyes. His pupils opened up slightly and he pulled on her hand and turned it over, so that his own hand was secure on top of hers. Then he pulled her closer to him and turned towards the camera with a smile. The woman smiled then, but it was not for the picture. The smile rose from her like mist from a clear lagoon in the middle of summer. It spread across her face like a transparent cloud barely touched by blue and pink, and her face became softer, and her cheeks became red and her eyes became brighter. Her body suddenly seemed to acquire curves it didn’t have before. She could feel her right hip barely touching the edge of his thigh and the sensation sent shivers all over her now relaxed body.
"There!" the friend said, and the camera clicked a couple of times. "That was good!"
The friend put the camera away. The boyfriend released the woman’s hands and the woman stepped away from the touch of his upper thigh and his wiry forearm. He started towards the sidewalk and the friend followed. The woman looked up at the shiny surface of the inverted funnel and at the angels that still struggled to climb to the peak. For a moment she admired their effort and she wondered at the nature of their plight. She wondered if it was love that propelled them forward and she wondered at the power of such love, love that could last a lifetime, love that could last beyond. For each of these angels, she thought, there must be many down in the darkness, unable even to start. She felt sympathy then for the lost ones, the ones that would always live in the shadows, the ones that would never make it up through the ground. When she turned back to the sidewalk, the friend and the boyfriend were already a hundred feet ahead. She rushed to catch up with them. In the distance, a violin was playing a strange sad melody. A car passed by and a group of teenagers were laughing loudly inside.
The friend turned around to see if the woman was coming. The friend smiled brightly when she saw the woman walking towards her, but the woman’s smile was gone again, along with the softness of her body and the brightness of her cheeks. The sunlight was too bright just then and the woman had to look down, away from her smiling friend, away from the shadow of her boyfriend, away from the bright light that would make her cry.

Harmless Intruder

We were driving down a gently twisting two lane road of paved black tar, slowly descending from a series of elevated hills down into a lower, flat valley. The land on either side of the car rolled with small supple hills; the gentleness of the hills was a reflection of the softness in the wind, which moved constantly like a controlled breath, cooling our skin with the grace and strength of a woman gliding across an empty dance floor. The unclouded sun was working to dry out each stalk of grass. There was still evidence of some green, although light gold was the predominant color of the landscape. The sun was high overhead and the light around us was bright white and crisp and we all wore sunglasses to protect ourselves against its radiation. The paved road was black and warm, it accepted us into its narrow passageway and we hugged the tight curves slowly, trying to capture every detail with our pens and lens.
We were alone on this stretch of road. We passed pale colored houses every now and again. Light blue single story houses with white curtains, cream colored barns and small family-sized vegetable gardens. We passed a few large pickup trucks in the driveways of the houses and American flags on the porches, but never an actual person. In this small stretch of country road, we seemed to be alone. These were small farms, miles away from the large industrial farms that extended their tight geometric rows of almonds trees for miles. This was family land and the houses were long ranch structures, built years ago and slightly beaten by the elements.
As we drove slowly along a tight curve in the road which veered to the right, I saw a cluster of decaying oak trees out the right back window of the car. I jolted upright and moved to grab my camera, but the vision went past before I could push the button. I couldn’t let it become a fuzzy thought in my memory, so we turned the car around and pulled the car over on the other side of the road, about fifty feet from the trees. I stepped out of the car and onto the soft earth. The ground was the color of white corn and fine as dust. The ignition was turned off, and we were left with the silence of the land. There were no motors, no voices or engines, just a soft buzzing of distant insects and my footsteps crunching small rocks on the pavement. I crossed the road and walked up the right side along a short fence. The fence was made of graying wood beams and barbed wire.
As I walked closer to the trees, I saw a cluster of cows on the right that I had missed as we drove past the first time. There were at least three dozen, all of them were adult and a shiny reddish brown color. Some were standing and eating, others were laying down, making larger imprints on the grass. There was a large oak tree close to them and a couple of cows were resting in the shade. They were large and their strength was impressive and I felt small as I approached the herd. They heard my approaching footsteps and turned to locate the source of the sound. Three dozen sets of eyes turned towards me all at once, each one seeking eye contact. Those whose bodies were turned from me twisted their heads in my direction. Some, caught chewing, watched me with blades of grass spurting from their mouths. Whatever they had been doing, they all found me and watched me walk. I was an outsider, walking through their world. Like the new arrival in a country western movie just stepping into the town’s saloon, they all turned to size me up. They looked at me, silent, observant, and feeling no threat, because none of them made a move to flee. They swooshed their tails and flies continued to land close to their eyes. I kept walking, a bit nervous, a bit self conscious in front of so many eyes. They stared, I stared. Behind low barbed wire fence. I passed them by a couple dozen feet and walked past them to the cluster of oak trees. Last I saw them, they were still looking at me, still examining the strange intruder that trespassed the silence of their quiet lives.