Foliate Oak September 2012

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Prose

Debra's Ghost
By Daniel Clausen

A couple of poor foreign English teachers in Japan. What could be more normal than that? Except we weren’t normal. (If such a thing exists). My Welsh roommate (whom I shall refer to simply as the “Welshman”) smoked too much, drank too much, and—more importantly—talked too much. I, on the other hand, was haunted.

Yes, we were normal in our abnormality.

                                                     ***

It’s a week before payday and the weather has gotten colder. Quickly approaching the state of absolutely broke, the Welshman and I have resorted to drinking cheap beer in our apartment and reminiscing about our pasts. Bad news, because whenever the past comes up, the ghost of Debra appears out of nowhere, sits down to take a load off, and starts talking in vague terms about problems―mine mostly, but sometimes just “problems.”

“You’ve got problems, I’ve got problems, the whole world’s got problems,” she says.

“Sometimes I think if we didn’t have these problems the whole world would stop spinning on her axis, we’d all stop spinning on our axises, axes, or whatever you want to call them, and then we’d have to settle into the nasty business of finding a way to be happy.”

I listen to her, sip my beer, and try to imagine what in the after-earth kind of problems a ghost would have.

And, because she can read my mind, she says, “Oh Lordy, you have no idea, young man. Life ends, but politics, well…” She leaves it at that. Then she checks her watch, as if she has somewhere to be.

More haunting to do? I ask, speechlessly.

She shrugs, “Or something.”

She makes herself ethereal and vanishes into thin air. But even though she disappears, she’s still there.
                                                              ***
Unlike many of the instructors at our company, the Welshman is a bit older―late twenties to be exact, as opposed to the fresh-out-of-college instructors you usually get. A bit wiser, maybe. Garrulous and long-winded, always. It turns out that before he came to Japan he worked at a community center where he looked after kids. For the last few days he’s talked and talked, giving me the substance and the flavor of his past.

And as he talks there always comes a point somewhere where I’m sure he’s going to ask about me. I can almost see that turn in the conversation, and when it appears all but inevitable, magically Debra walks through the door―literally (or supernaturally) through the door. She sits down at the table in our living room, smiles, and begins a monologue or some bit of word play. The Welshman doesn’t ask me about my past, or he does, but I’m too transfixed by her ghost to answer. And she sits there and lingers through the night, talking, raving—sometimes about the weather, or sometimes about the loneliness of after-living. On occasions, she waits for the Welshman to finish, other times she talks right through his speeches and he goes to bed long before she finishes.

                                                              ***
Another night and more cheap beer. Will payday ever come? I take a sip of my Nodogoshi on the couch of our living room. It briefly occurs to me that I should do something to break the cycle of pain; one monologuer is enough, but two―and sometimes at the same time!―was more than any person could bear.

I look over in the direction of the Welshman who is absorbed in a book on British politics.

“You don’t even have to ask, mate. British politics is spicier than your Spanish telenovela: sex scandals, coke overdoses, and more egocentric mindfucks than even your American celebrities could muster.”

He puts the book down and gets a good stretch going. “Well, here we are again, broke and cast off by our fellow teachers, who I assume are just as broke as us and apartment-bound. Don’t suppose you have any plans for the night? Should have gotten that hot girl's phone number. Nothing cheaper than a good ol’ fashion booty call. Want to finish up the Nodogoshi? Lucky thing I stocked up. You should watch yourself though. A few beers in and I always catch you looking out into space, or mumbling stuff to yourself. By the way, did I tell you I used to work at a community center?”

“Yeah, only about a hundred times.”

“Right mate, sorry. Emmm, okay. Well anyway, there was this one time, right. I was helping these kids stage a play―not really a play, like, just a few scenes from Romeo and Juliet. Stop me if you’ve heard this one. And this one kid, I forget his name. I want to say his name is Buzz Saw or Flint, some stereotypical hooligan name, because he’s only twelve or thirteen but he has arms like a trucker. Let’s just call him ‘Bruno’ or ‘Shark.’ Which would you prefer? I’m more a ‘Bruno’ guy, myself.”

“Let’s go with ‘Shark,’” I reply.

“Well then, ‘Shark’ it is. Anyway, Sharky is this right huge fucker. Twelve or thirteen, like I said, but he looks like someone’s been injecting him with steroids since he was five. Anyway, to make matters worse, ol’ Sharky has been held back a grade or two, so he like towers over these other ten and eleven-year-olds. As you might imagine, he’s got a real chip on his shoulder from being left back and people thinking he’s stupid and what not. So I figure I’ll let ol’ Sharky play Tybalt, figure he’s spot on to play him, right? And he’s like ‘I’m not doin’ no fuckin’ play like no sissy’ and I’m like ‘for fucks sake mate, all you have to do is read from the book and play around with your sword.’ I even let him ad lib his lines and what not.

“Anyway, all the other kids start gettin’ kind of short with Sharky because he keeps messing up his lines and even his ad libs don’t really make any kind of sense. Anyway, after we spend a bit of time practicing, I turn my back for a second to go get some balls and shit for them to play with for the rest of the period. But when I turn back, Sharky has this kid pinned down and is hitting him over the head with a rock. A freakin’ rock man! Like the size of my fist. I mean this thirteen-year-old Conan fucker is going for his life. Here’s this scrawny fucker with like blood gushing out his skull and he’s unconscious, and I pull Sharky off of him, and the police and the ambulance come and it’s a bloody nightmare. And I feel God-awful because I was responsible for them, you know. Not just the kid lying on the ground, but Sharky too. I knew the kid was a right hooligan, and I knew he couldn’t be trusted alone. Fuck. I let both those little cunts down. But I let Sharky down even more because the kid kind of trusted me. We had a rapport and what not. Fuck. I mean what the fuck was the point of that?”

“That sounds pretty awful,” I say, kind of staring off into space. There’s a moment of silence. Here it is, I think. Here is the moment the Welshman is going to ask about my past. Debra will magically float through the window or pass through the wall, sit down at that table over there, massage her knees to get the kinks out, say something like, “When you get my age, not everything works the way it’s supposed to. And this whole spooking people business has a way of wearing a woman out,” and then I would be stuck with her for the rest of the night. I would drink beer and the sound of Debra’s voice would overtake the Welshman’s.
But she doesn’t appear.

Instead, I can see Sharky in my imagination. He’s got the rock in his hand, and as he’s going for the final blow, he turns to me and winks. Why does he wink? I ask myself. The next thing I know, Sharky is picking up the body, unconscious and limp, and pitching it into a pool. For a moment, something starts in my brain; like fire it works its way through my neurons, down to every part of my body, and I want to laugh. The better part of me stops myself, but a smile must creep out because the Welshman asks me, “What’s so funny, mate?”

“Nothing, it’s just that I know Sharky.”

“Aw mate, it’s hard to know it living in ol’ Nagasaki, but the world is full of Sharkies. Dumb motherfuckers who don’t know their arsehole from a hole in the wall, and go around stomping other people’s brains out because they have no fucking conception of the way the world works. I suppose I used to be a little like that. Bit of a nutter in my youth. Now I just drink more.”

We both laugh a little at that, and he gives me a playful punch on the shoulder.


“....Anyway, figured I was going to get fired, so I decided ‘well, might as well up and quit.’ But then the manager comes to me—old fellow, a friend of mine, heart of gold and all that. He levels with me, says like he can’t find anyone else to do the job for the pay and begs me not to go because he doesn’t think he can get anyone else. Figure, in for a penny in for a pound, that’s the price you pay for working with hard-luck kids and what not. So I stick around and you know what happens a week later?”

“What?”

“Some kid gets glassed―glassed, mate! Not my class, mind you. But I hear some kid screaming real loud, and I run into the other classroom, and there’s this kid in another class with glass and blood all over his face. One of those old fashioned coke bottles. I mean come on mate, how are these kids learning this shite? Are they taking courses: Bar Fighting 101, Hooliganology 203―fucking hell. All we have to do is squeeze out a few scenes of Shakespeare and spend the rest of the period playing kickball or something, and these cunts can’t stop stoning and glassing each other. The poor girl who’s in charge of the class is in the corner freaking out, and she doesn’t know what to do. So I have to call the police, and they of course bring the ambulance and the fire department, and we go through the whole thing over again with the reports and what not. We spend the rest of the year showing movies, just so we can watch over them and make sure they’re not trying to gouge each others' eyeballs out.”

The Welshman rubs his face. “And how did the fucker get his hands on a rock? We were indoors for Christ sakes. Sharky must have had it in his pocket, keeping it around for just the right occasion. Maybe I was just lucky it was ‘stoning Thursday’ instead of ‘knife-in-the-back Wednesday.’”

The Welshman goes to the fridge and gets some beers for us.

“Hey, I got an idea. Maybe the new guy has some money we can borrow. That might get us out of the house for a little bit. A night on the piss might do us both a bit of good.”

“No,” I say. “I’d rather not spend any money that’s not mine.”

This is the moment. I crack open my Nodogoshi and get ready for it. Might as well be a little buzzed when she arrives, bringing with her vague talk about unresolved problems and how the times are changing. I think for a moment that she might try something a little different. She might knock this time. I look around, but before anything can happen, the Welshman is talking again.

“Well, I think I’m going to take a break from the boob-tube tonight. Although, I have to say, I’ve developed a fine appreciation for MacGyver thanks to the old Kaigai drama channel. Wonder if that guy ever took a glass to the ol’ noggin. Clever guy, but looks as if he might be a bit of a sissy when it comes to bar fights.”

I feel a chill run through my body. I look around for the ghost of Debra, but she still doesn’t appear. Despite her absence, the chill hints that her presence is spread deep throughout the apartment.

“You know mate, you’re not really much of a talker,” the Welshman says.

Here it comes, I think.

As I listen to the Welshman, I can also feel my mind leave my body. It walks over to the balcony, opens the sliding glass door, and steps out. It looks for something. It looks down at the street, where it can see a solitary cat walking around near our building. Just one cat. The superreal me stares at the cat and the cat stares at me. My body eventually catches up with my spirit, and now the real me is standing on the balcony looking at the cat. Its reality is written over by its superreality.

The Welshman follows me with a cigarette. “Seem to be in a bit of a daze lately, mate. Maybe you miss home, maybe you’re a bit stressed, or maybe it’s something else. If you’re hallucinating because you’re on something, I mean fair enough―just don’t be holding out on the rest of us. Leave that open for a second, will you? I want to get a quick smoke in. If it’s something else that’s got you peeved, do pipe up. Communication is what being a good flatmate is all about.”

I continue to stare at the cat. Even from the sixth floor I can see its deep green eyes looking through me.

“It’s getting to be winter, I reckon. What do you think? You know, if you leave something unresolved into winter, it has a way of dragging itself all the way into spring. Reckon we’ll see any snow?”

“What?” I say. “Were you saying something?”

“Nothing important, mate. I was expounding on the meaning of life and giving you the foolproof, empirically reproducible formula to riches, voluptuous women, and eternal happiness, that’s all. Why don’t you tell me something about yourself? I sit here every day and tell you about myself. Almost seems a bit rude for you to just sit there not saying anything.”

And there it is. But where is she? The cat sits by the sidewalk and looks up at me.
“Not so much to tell.”

“Yeah, mate. Well, I’m sure you can find something to talk about. Maybe you can start with your parents.”

The cat just sits there. It licks its paws and waits patiently for the world to unfold.
“No, never knew my parents.”

“Right, sorry. I knew that actually. You told me that a while ago. I just forgot. Em, hmm, then where do we start, mate?”

The cat sits down on the sidewalk, lays back, and begins to massage its knees.
I start with Debra.

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Daniel Clausen has been published in Slipstream Magazine, Spindrift, Leading Edge, and Zygote in my Coffee, among other venues. The Ghosts of Nagasaki is his third book and is loosely based on his experiences living in Nagasaki, Japan. Pre-release copies of The Ghosts of Nagasaki are available from the author. You can email him at: lexicalfunk@gmail.com. You can learn more about Daniel here.

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Taming of the Shrewd

By George Djuric

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All Man Can Betray Is His Conscience - Joseph Conrad

Once upon a time I was just a few brain cells short of genius. At least I felt so. This conceit came across smoothly, and no matter what I did it refused to leave : the floating sensation of a gypsy band travelling through the essence of reality, the Cirque du Soleil of being one with the universe; a blind date with Aphrodite.

All my troubles didn't start in Teba Hecatompilos, that was Borges' Alamo, but in a similar place: a local library. I was five years old when my aunt took me there and pointed at the wonder of the world. I don't think I was that much of an asshole back then, maybe an asshole's apprentice, so my scream had sincerity written all over it: "But what am I going to read once I'm done with these books?!: My dear aunt wasn't on par with the question, and my very first existential incertitude went uncomforted.

Even at this early age of mine I could clearly see the traces of betrayal, a foggish abbreviation from the path of genius: reading made me too comfortable from the get go - always a bad omen. I was forming a shell around me, a parallel reality; the more furnished that castle became, the less appealing the outdoors activities reflected in my binoculars. Then Winter would come, as it does once a year, and my father, grandpa, uncle Brne, and uncle Zika would wrestle a three hundred pound hog in the yard and slice its throat open, shattering my shelter into pieces and leaving me bare naked in the frost.

I picked up a lot of action in my early teens: street fighting daily, getting addicted to the fumes of rally cars, eyeing girls in the class. The latter two went on to supercharge the Fata Morgana, belittling my inside prodigy even further. Listening to this dubious scenario life was yet to be, full-blown and essential. At this rate of accelerated self delay, I was going to wake up one stellar morning into the splendor of being my future self, only to get crushed as it caved in on me under the weight of built-in void.

I became a Matrix freak who lives and fights while comfortably resting in a lazy boy (a tube sticking into his skull), a boy who cried holy hand grenade, a zombie at the end of a business trip. The only credible biographer of my petty existence would have been Marcel Marceau. And he'd laugh silently.

The Disney period of my life lasted until I turned nineteen, featuring a Mickey Mouse in every serious endeavor I approached. There went the most creative years, brain juices turned into soft drink and spilled out with bubbles gone, while on the surface I had the best of times. My perception was blurred with shiny objects of fun, those beads that bought the island of Manhattan from natives like me. Then Led Zeppelin came along, spraying tons of nitrogen into overheated crowds, making sure the song remained the same long enough.

The real - and I better be careful with this slimy word - the real tectonic shift occurred once I got my Fiat and went onto making an Abarth out of it. It was like an old-fashioned recipe: you take the engine apart, mix it well with tuned header, bored cylinders, a pinch of valves, and a sharp angled camshaft, and before you could pronounce piston (pissed-on), you can tailor desired horse power. Depending on the bore of your pockets, there was a class to choose: more money - easier prestige and fame, less competition; less money - more fun, much more competition, and wide proving grounds. Just don't forget your dog tags, since fatalities rise proportionally.

This coming of age phase, while exceptionally condensed, thrilling, and accomplishing, was the final blow to my genial future: from that point on all I could hope to attain was the title of genius on wheels, something Niki Lauda said about Walter Rohrl. By the time I was done with racing, only few years later, the integrity of my mental forces was sloping downward, the ease of style vanished, and the best case scenario morphed into friendly face of an idiot savant.

At this point I didn't want to count pennies, or split gilded hairs, I just wanted to figure out what to do with my future, if anything. Quite a sad point: I was in my prime, yet my alter ego mirrored that autistic Indian over there on the corner of lunacy and the main street, quoting from Black Elk with a natural ease that drove my namesake George Armstrong Custer hysterical.   Of course, I could have done anything I wanted: there was plenty of time and juice to become, say, a brilliant writer, a vocation I always eyed with envy; or a professor of something, a millionaire. Even worse, I could have comfortably envisioned these paths to a diminutive vignette, smell of odors, indulge in applause.

I guess it was the predictability of desirable careers, or any other future direction, that robbed me blind. I just sat there.

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George Djuric is a former rally racing champion, master chess player, taxi driver, street fighter, student of anti-psychiatry and philosophy, broker with Morgan Stanley… and a writer all the way. Published a critically acclaimed collection of short stories that altered Yugoslav literary scene - 'The Metaphysical Stories' - was dubbed Borges of the Balkans, as well as reborn Babel. Also, he published a trucking road memoir 'Riding with the Big Boys' in the U.S. Djuric infiltrates flashes from his vivid past into fictional alchemy for the salient taste of the 21st century.

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Adele's Summit
By William Falo

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Adele placed one foot on the hill and lost her balance. It angered a flock of geese and they flapped their wings sending loose feathers into the air. They floated down on top of her and she thought of the day they covered Johan’s coffin with dirt. A group of skateboarders stopped to laugh. “Can you believe that she used to be a famous mountain climber?”

A boy that lived behind her pointed down at her when he spoke. “She can’t even climb a hill now.”

Someone looked down from the top of the hill. Adele looked away and her hand started to shake, when she remembered Johan’s face while he slid past her on K2. Her hand reached out for him, but grasped only snow. She never knew who helped her down that day, but nobody would help her up now.

The person on the hill vanished. A gust of wind blew the feathers off of her; they drifted away like her dream of becoming the first woman to summit all fourteen 8000 meter mountains.

She walked away from the hill and knew there would be no summit today. When she drove away, she saw a mother walk up the hill holding hands with two small children. It looked so easy. At home, she went outside and sat on the deck.

“Hey, Adele,” the neighbor behind her called out.

“Hi Tyler,” she said.

“We’re having a small pool party tonight. Do you want to come?” He skimmed the pool with a long pole.

“No thanks. I have plans.”

“Okay. If you change your mind, just come over,” he walked back to his deck. The boy from the park skated up to him.

She heard laughter and turned away suspecting that they were talking about her. She clenched her fist then opened it and started to walk toward the fence that bordered the two houses, but remembered that the boy’s mother died a year ago in a car accident. She retreated to her house.

At night, the lights of the party illuminated her house. She avoided the windows afraid they would see her shadow and know she lied about her having plans.

Someone laughed when she walked into the kitchen. She hid in the den and stared at a picture of Johan.

She tugged at her wedding ring and thought about when he proposed. They practiced

climbing on a hill in the Pine Barrens. They each carried fifty pounds of gear in mid-summer.

She slipped and collapsed on the sandy trail. He knelt beside her and gripped her hand. At the top of Jemima Mount he gave her an engagement ring.

The music blared from the party. She walked through the house ducking under the windows. Feeling like a prisoner, she got in the car and drove into the Wharton State Forest. When the sand road ended, she walked down the fire trail. A sad owl hooted in the distance. The hill looked like a mountain.

Clouds drifted by the moon as she stared up and a single bat darted by her. It came so close to her hair that she ducked when it passed. A few steps up the trail made her breath become rapid. The dream of mountain climbing again seemed to fade away forever. Farther up the hill, Johan looked down on her.

“Don’t be afraid,” he said.

She blinked but the image didn’t go away. He held out his hand and she walked farther up the slope toward him. Someone coughed and the image disappeared.

Alone on the slope, panic set in when she saw a man standing on the summit. She fell backwards and rolled to the bottom of the hill. When she looked up again she saw a small girl looking down on her. Adele rubbed the sand out of her eyes and the girl was gone.

Hallucinations plagued her ever since the tragedy on K2 and she hurried back to the truck in tears. The sand flew out from behind the wheels like a wake behind a speedboat when she left. The party still lit up her backyard when she got home and she sat in the dark. Johan stayed away. The image on the hill haunted her. Unable to sleep, she put on the television. Dust blurred the image when a news channel flashed the picture of a girl. A lady with tears running down her face talked into a microphone. “Please help me find my little girl.”

They showed the girl again. Adele walked bent over toward the screen. She wiped away the dust and gasped. The reporter said, “Chloe is ten years old and was taken from a front lawn in broad daylight.”

“That’s her,” Adele yelled. She recognized the girl from the top of the hill.

She called the number on the screen. A lady answered and listened to her, then abruptly cut her off.

“She’s in danger,” Adele said.

“It can’t be her. That location is miles away, but we will send someone to check in the morning. We have lots of more reliable tips to follow up on first,” she said and hung up.

Adele dropped the cell phone. She heard people laughing at the party. They started to sing and became louder with each song.

She pictured the girl standing on top of the hill that Johann proposed to her on. What would that man do to Chloe? Adele paced the room, until she heard the teens at the party laughing. She grabbed her keys and dashed out the door. The truck squealed when she drove down the street toward the woods.

Half way there, she realized that her cell phone was still on the floor where she dropped it. She stopped farther away from the hill then last time. Dark clouds drifted past the moon, and they moved faster than she ever saw before. It seemed like time sped up. Shadows darted between trees and each one became a threat to pounce on her.

Every step that she took seemed too loud. The scent of death hit her and she held her nose. A red fox chewed on the leg of a dead deer, when she came near it darted off.  An arrow stuck up from the deer’s flank. A hunter failed to track his kill or the man on the hill shot it. With no light, she feared an unseen arrow heading toward her head and she kept low to the ground.

In the darkness, she fell over a stump and twisted her ankle. Pain seared through her and she bit her hand to stop from screaming out. She sat on the ground and knew she should go back. What could she do? She was broken.

A sound in the distance could have been a girl crying. Adele got up and limped down the trail.  The hill loomed before her like a wall. She stared up at the distant summit and collapsed on the trail. Tears formed in her eyes and one fell to the ground. It landed in a footprint. She remembered seeing Johan on the hill. She stood up and picked up a broken branch, then struggled up the hill using the branch as a cane. Everything seemed to become quiet. Something flashed on top of the hill. It could have been heat lightning or someone turned on a flashlight.

Without looking back, she reached the edge of the summit. The pain in her ankle intensified and the sky spun in a circle. A flame flickered from behind a group of trees, and she noticed an outline of a person. The man looked like a giant when he stood up. She stayed on the edges of the light; in the darkness. A smaller shadow moved inside the tent. Chloe.

The man lifted a bottle to his mouth. She smelled the whiskey and hoped that he was drunk. She crawled toward the tent without a plan. The man entered it and the girl started to cry when he grabbed her.

Adele picked up the branch, and opened the tent flap. The man looked up and dropped the girl. Adele swung the branch and it broke against his face. The recoil knocked her backwards. Chloe screamed and the man came out of the tent with streaks of blood across his face,

“You bitch. I’ll kill you,” he said and stumbled toward her. She crawled backwards and grabbed one of the arrows out of a pack that leaned against a tree. She moved toward a ridge on the hill. The man snarled and charged her. At the last second she jabbed the arrow toward his chest. It sunk in and he fell forward, narrowly missing her. He yelled as he tumbled over the edge of the hill and disappeared. A hollow thud echoed through the woods followed by silence.

The girl sobbed in the tent. Adele opened the flap and the girl backed up. “It’s okay,” she said and reached out.

Chloe crawled into her arms and collapsed. Adele helped her up, and they hurried down the hill. Every sound they heard created images of the man in their minds. They held hands, and she felt relief when they reached the truck. She drove straight to the ranger station and burst in the doors.

The dispatcher jumped up, “What’s going on?”

Adele collapsed and pointed at Chloe, “The missing girl.”

The people in the station gathered around the girl. Adele slipped out the door. 
                                             
####

The party still claimed to life despite the lack of coherent singing. Adele limped past the windows and let the lights shine on her

The next morning, Chloe appeared on the television, “Please, whoever helped me. I want to thank you. I want to meet you.”  Adele smiled. The reporter said they managed to find the man’s body after following Chloe’s story. But nobody knew who helped her.

Adele looked up at the hill. The summit looked farther away than last time. With a crooked stick, she struggled up the slope. She reached the summit and lifted the branch into the air. She looked in the direction of K2 and yelled. The skateboarders below the hill stopped and looked up at her then skated away without saying a word.

William Falo’s stories have appeared or are forthcoming in Emrys Journal, Shalla Magazine, Mississippi Crow, 34th Parallel, Skyline Review, Oak Bend Review, Open Wide Magazine, The Linnet’s Wings, The View From Here, The Monarch Review, and many others.

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