MANO A WOMANO, PART FOUR
The 4th part
in an Bark Barmoreal Series
by
Jaremy Tyson
First off, I want to say thank you for
sticking with this story all week, even though there’s a good
chance you went willy-nilly through all four parts on Monday
or Tuesday. Well, shame on you, because this is the kind of
writing that’s supposed to simmer gently in the mind for hours
and hours – a veritable regale for the intellect
– and you just treated it like a burger and fries.
To those of you who
can follow directions, here’s the fourth day’s work. All your
questions will not be answered. I’m glad we had this
brief time together.
-Marc Arboreal
I could have sworn there was something
important to do that day. Let’s see, I thought: clothes are
clean, looks like there are plenty of foodstuffs on hand, still
waiting for that call back from the post office…
There were a lot of weeds around
the tomato plants in front, and though I was pretty sure that
wasn’t it I went to work on ‘em anyway. I figured either that
was it or getting busy with my hands would help me remember
just what it actually was. So I put on a wide-brim hat to protect
my face from the Texas sun, and I knelt down in the dirt.
After what seemed like only a few
minutes, it occurred to me that I might have underestimated
the heat. The garden thermometer read 102 but was notoriously
inaccurate. The thermometer on my keychain said 99, and I thought
of Angie. Angie graduated in 99, maybe.
But who exactly was Angie? I wasn’t
sure. That must be the thing to do. Find Angie.
A lot of houses had been built around
here in the last few years, I thought. That lot there used to
be knee deep in water, before the levee got built.
Thirty minutes later, the tomatoes
were liberated from their parasites. I picked the paper off
the front porch, hosed my hands off a little bit, and went in
for a glass of iced tea.
Only a moment after sitting down,
I jumped up again. There it was, in the sports section: a soccer
game out at the university. That was it.
I never miss a soccer game.
