Vision - The Goddess

     I met the goddess upon a stair in a realm adjacent. She was vague, both someone I thought I knew once and a shimmer at the edge of vision. 

     The many of us, golden, had swept the countryside of summer to line our pockets with its sweet smoke. The scent of it the chaff of what we should have gathered. No matter, we said as the rains set in. We would have each other.

     I look back on those days and see faces. So many faces. Faces I loved or said I did anyway. Faces turned away so I have to gently tap on a shoulder and lean in front of them to see if they are who I remember. I see them in the rust on a leaf, in the raindrops against the window. They watch me from their shadows on the floor. I know now they are an illusion, an artifact of the filter over everything. Yet they stare.

     The actual number of us was lost to antiquity. You see, there were only ever two of us on the stair. What had seemed to be a crowd for so long was merely a single companion. He is to me as I am to the clouds. That is to say, a flood.

     Kerry climbed the stairs with me. Unadorned stone stacked to the sky ahead of us, a surf of pleasant nothing behind us. In the surrounding darkness, star after star lit up in the black. Wander, not fear laughed at the edges of the world and levity carried the day. Kerry and I the pair, the binary.

     In leaving behind the flax of day, we traded in our vast rebellion for a dance. It seemed a promise of treasure, to us. From the outside, from the faces, it must have seemed a blunder. To give up so much in exchange for something so fleeting. To us, it was first a bounty, in the end, empty of value. It was so generous of the universe to free us from the debt of success.

     On we trudged, up, towards the narrows. A temple aglow waited for us at the top. As the stair rose higher, it became steeper and thinner. It twisted as it lifted higher. I looked over to see Kerry climbing a separate staircase somewhere n the distance. His reached high into the darkness. Where it led was not for me to know.

     I lost him in there. A face, now quiet among the others. On the bark of a tree or in a cloud. In the embers of the fire staring back at me. Loved, like the rest of the fictions, but indistinct. On I went to meet the goddess.

     The stairs led to a platform above a wide valley carved in gossamer and hung from the Great Arch. Much too precious to harbour life, the valley shone of fundamental frequencies and poured harmonics into the canyon to the north. A photophany glittering on filament and star, the whelm of it seeming to obey no law. No further could I go.

     I stood before the Valley of Light, the Lucent Gown of Mystery, The Lady Herself, Vision.  The landscape dispersed into a fog of memory. She smiled, in the way of statues,  permanent and subtle. She reached for me as I to Her, She with her knowledge, me with my clumsy arms. I could only flail to stay afloat swallowed inside Her eyes.

     We looked out over the vastness. Her eye the rim of a crater open to the universe all above me. I should have been terrified of the beauty, but I was no longer that person. The goddess began to draw and I watched through the circle.

     The night itself swirled under her pen and little wakes were pulled along with each crisp stroke. Each mark she made upon reality rippled against the firmament, waves spreading and running over other waves reflected off the edge of forever. A storm of noise and light rose and crossed the galaxy. Patterns formed in the interference. Shapes and symbols so bright that even the faces in the dark were lit. 

     I could feel her smile from my nest in her vision. She reached out to the stars at the centre of her eye and gently dipped her pen in the centre of the storm. The maelstrom calmed at her touch and the symbols came to a focus. An Antikytheran motion of interlocking rings filled the circle of her eye and imagery ticked about the mesh. It was gibberish. Nonsense of unknowably distant light painted into echoes and approximations of language. Simply, it was my name, written in the stuff of stars.

     We both laughed. Her chuckle a chime at the tempered locus of hope, mine the lorn rasp of the brash. With the conclave ended, She released me back to colour, green, and to the faces in the dew drops on the grass. At my feet, I gazed at the multitude around me. One stood out among the others: a tiny quatrefoil sprout in the lawn staring back at me. I picked it and placed it in the pages of a novel.

Thanks for reading.

Pete

Short Story - Gift of Ravens

I was born Fred, son of the seventies and alcoholic parents. We were poor, pretty much living off what mom could catch and whatever dad didn't piss away. It wasn't always like that. I remember mom and dad smiling. But that was a long time ago, before we moved into the shack.

Our little shack on the river wasn't much, but it was our everything, and the flood of '82 took it all away. I didn't miss it. There was only one thing in that shack I ever loved: my white guitar. It was a Telecaster knockoff my dad got from a catalog. I even had an amp for it for a while. It sounded just fine when it wasn't plugged in. I must have got a real gem from that factory in China, or maybe my young ears just couldn't get enough of those bell like tones from the upper frets, the growl from the open chords. I'm still after that sound. Every time I get up on stage, that's the guitar I want in my hands. I hear it when that first rush takes away the pain, my eyes roll back and I drift on that twang.

Sometimes I go down to the river and imagine I could just duck under the rapids and there would be that dime store plank. One day the river will give it up. I think the white of the rapids is hiding that six string, taunting me. Calling me names. Playing keep away. Sometimes I hate the river.

I went to live with a woman everybody called grandmother. She played a beat up old Martin. Said her dad traded a skin for it. She never let me play it. Kept telling me its not my time. She brought me a little toy ukulele. I played it, sure, but it just didn't have the soul of that white electric.

Well she was old and it wasn't long 'for she moved on from this world. So I took that beat up old box down to the township and I played. I played for the punks but they wouldn't hear a kid on acoustic. I played at the bar but I'd get too drunk and the chords wouldn't play. I played for the old folks, but they didn't like my songs so I played on the street. Nobody pays you nothing on the street.

Once in a while, that little bit of nothing can get you high. You run with the right kids and you can get your hands on whatever they sell.

It wasn't long before I found a band that would have me. Changed my name. Grandmother used to call me the Thunderbird, the way I cried, and the way I fought. 

We do alright, for what we are. We're the local blues band, if that's what you're after. We play a lot of covers. People around here don't go for the original. Well, at least not our original. Play most night's down at Kai's bar. We go down to the big city sometimes, gig around, score some dope.

A couple of the guys work a day. Not me. Can't dig on that early morning brown bag commuter chaos crap. I still get by.

The pain of sobriety picks you up in the night. It breaks the glass and unlocks the door. It takes your change and tosses your drawer. It won't sleep until it hits and then it wets himself and won't come back for days. It gets him kicked out of his apartment and it hocks his amp. It has its own pocket. You can't put anything in it but the brown and his rig. It tells me my blood is poison when I'm sober. I'll die if I don't fix.

You can get yourself cleaned up at the church. Get yourself some black wings for your black heart. Maybe food, if you can stomach it. Ask the preacher if he'll buy your guitar for five bucks. Old man never gives me any money so the pain comes in and takes some from the plate, looks around for anything else it could hock. But its not enough so it pawns that old Martin for fifty bucks and it finds itself in the woods three days later.

*******

Too often these days I wake up in a dream.

There are two dreams. In one I am flightless, clawing at the ground to move, but only slow down, lurch, crawl and writhe in place. I've never known what I'm trying to run from. The worms creep past me, mocking my immobility as the monster coldly marches after me. The concrete is soft and my hands dig right in, but it's like the muddy ground after the rain and my hands find no grip. And every time it seems the beast gets closer, his hot breath on my neck a taste of the hell that awaits me. And I wake, and that hell is here.

The other dream scares the shit out of me.

I am awake, aware, in a familiar place. I am at the bank of the river, where it bends on its way to the big city. I'm playing my old guitar, but it won't keep time and I can't turn it up because the amp is in the river. The patch slithers among the rocks and disappears in the 60 cycle froth; the pedaling ring of the crowd I've always wanted. My dad behind me now, son, he says, this shack is all you'll ever know. And the electric crowd rushes up the bank and I let go of the guitar, easily, like I trust the river to give it back to me one day. And I wake.

In a foggy corner up above the old highway, I'm not sure I've ever been here before. The roar of the river taunts me like it always has. Shh, it says, hush, it is cars on the highway, a truck belches past, on its way to somewhere better, no doubt. It is a brash, pulsing sound. Haw! It laughs at me. Haw! I close my eyes tight, if I don't see it, it can't hurt my junkie heart. And I realize the fog isn't real, the truck isn't laughing at me, it's a bird. A bird so black it has me blind! The bird is laughing! Haw! I am a little boy again, the ugly kid, the stupid one, the one with no parents. Haw! Again I wake.

Still that fog; that sound. I wonder if they are the same. Dull laughter, a long forgotten memory come calling, only I can't remember his name and he won't look at me. And I'm still blind, lost, and tiny. Grandmother reaches out for me and I run. It hits me, the poison blood, the headaches, the pain; all absent. I'm either dreaming or I'm high so I settle into it.

There is debris all around me, pallets, driftwood, old tires, and a raven has parked himself among the broken chairs. He watches me as I brush off some of the dirt, rub my stubbly chin and look at the mess. I've shit my pants and I have puke all over my shirt and the front of my jeans. I smell bad, but I don't care. The pain is gone, I'm awake, so I must have had a good night. I kick the empty bottle of whiskey at the bird and a wall of dirt smacks me in the face. I push away from it, turning, and I'm on the ground again and my mouth tastes like mud. Its probably better that way. I manage a sitting position. The raven hasn't moved, it just stares, like it wants me to do the talking.

"I'm not in the mood," I growl.

Haw! Haw! The raven laughs at me again, motionless, he laughs. He's not looking at me, he never was. He is brooding over the pile of wood and debris. Broken pallets, dressers hacked to pieces, a door, and a dirty shard of white.

I've seen that bit of wood before. A little metal ring on the bottom curve, near the strap peg. There would be a big scratch on the front, the result of dragging out from under the bed a bit too quickly when I was ten. The three way switch is bent and the knob missing since the day I got it.

The pick guard is melted near the switch where mom dropped her cigarette on it. Its smooth all along the back of the neck, not a single mark. Fretboard worn out in patterns, at the top, second and third frets, and at the twelfth fret up to the C#, wear patterns shaped like the blues. I want it across my lap with its comforting weight, slick neck. I want to tap my foot, count out four, and play.

I focus on that bit of white sticking out of that pile. It consumes me. I feel like the first time I hit. I'm finally alive. I lean forward from my repose into a crawl. My head is swimming in fire and my vision is blurry. I scramble forward, in slow motion. It reminds me of that dream and I get the sensation that I'm being watched. The raven laughs at me again. The raven. I can't see it anymore, but I'm sure he hasn't ruffled a single feather. Its days before I can see where I'm going and my throat is getting dry. I have to move a busted up coffee table before I can lift up the pallet that's sitting on my guitar.

"It was never yours, bird brain," the raven caws. "That guitar always belonged to the river."

A chair tumbles off the pile on the other side and it's free. My guitar. White. Light. It must be the dawn.

When I wake up, this time it's real. Eyes are savage balls of rusted steel, tearing at my eyelids. My teeth are each made of vile electrical wire, parallel, and hooked to 12 volts DC. The earth, my bed for now, is soaked in rain that must have been ice not long ago. My aching skull, the unwitting participant in the river only knows what. My legs feel like tubes of cyanide. If they move, I'll blackout and the beast will have his way with me. I don't want to go back to the dream but I don't want to be awake. I roll over onto my back and something jabs me in the kidney. Fucking rocks, I mutter, and swoon my way to sitting.

I'm in a junkyard. Some hoarder lives out here in the woods and collects shit. There are all shapes of bird feeders hanging all over the place. An old VW bus rusts its way back to the oblivion it came from. Wood piles every which way featuring every imaginable piece of broken, burnt, cement-covered, or otherwise used wood. One piece even looks like a leg. At least I have my pair, I spit, even if they are trying to kill me.

When most people wake up in the morning they eat. I can't. My appetites pull me in another direction.

As I survey the wreckage I find myself in, I'm looking for anything of value. Give me an antique treasure and those nasally Brits and their "I sawr this piece at auction six year ago go for three thousand sterling." Tell me the owner has a grow op out back I could pinch a bit to trade back in town, wherever that is. Pickings look slim. There might be a carburetor in the van I could lift, given time and a wrench.

As I put my hand down to try to stand, it comes down on frets, and I'm right back in the night, raven looming over me. As I pulled the wrecked guitar from the pile, my elation turned to that foul morning when you know the hope you held out was for nothing. And the raven just laughed at me.

A black bird perched atop a broken, leaning flagpole. It looks at me sideways in that roadkill eating bet-you-can't-catch-me way. It looks almost wooden the way it just stares. That eye a little black marble I can't hide from.

"You humans are all the same," he crowed. "You covet such fleeting things." Not a flutter of wing nor a flick of his head.

"This was my life," I whispered.

Raven's midnight beak frozen in a malevolent smile croaks, "It is a piece of wood."

Its my old guitar alright. The fat curves of the butt so familiar, and so trashed. Streaks of red-brown pour over that once pristine white. A massive crack has opened up from the strap button to just under the peeling, rusted bridge. Every crevice is a sandy, heartrending gash.

"You have lived so much since that far off day." The raven's coarse cackle is a tendril that drives for the deep water; that which hides under my own black feathers. "The river teaches. It has been there for men for millennia as a mother. Provider."

This reminds me of Grandmother's words. I always thought she was trying to soothe me. She said the river never meant you harm. The river is our life. It collects the far off snows that fall all winter long all over the lands. It stores them up. In the summer and fall, when the land bursts with life, and the salmon run, the river slows down with the pain of birth. Trees and rocks and mud clot the narrows, and she strains. The tributaries fare no better. She never goes a season without letting go. That tragic year you hate saw much snow, then rain, then drought. Our people are lucky we walked away as we did.

She always said it was a shame we didn't heed the lesson.

Two of the three brass saddles are gone and the bridge is hanging by a screw. A few bits of the pick-guard still adhere where the screws hold it down, but it is otherwise smashed, dusty pearloid shards. The lipstick neck pickup has been removed, by the scavenger who found it or by the torrent that took it from me.

I sob, "The only thing thing that river ever gave me is pain." What comes out is a babble. Something about the river should give me a fix. If it was such a mother, it wouldn't let me live near it. It would have never taken away my home, my family.

The neck plate is rusted to shit, all four screws still hold it together. The crusty serial number mocks me. A great scar runs along the fretboard. A chunk torn from the pocket to the eighteenth fret, sand spills out as I turn the guitar. The headstock is cracked nearly in half along its length, with four pockmarked tuners remaining. The once sinuous curves now a jagged cliff. My hand forms that familiar claw, but where I expect strings and fret wire, I find only a fretboard made of canyons. It will never play again.

I am wracked by tears. I need a C. I need it to ring out through the forest. I need an E minor. Maybe if it reaches the river it will know my pain. If I could stop crying long enough to play a G you might hear that I mean it. And if I had Grandmother's Martin right now I'd show you what real D sounds like. All I can do is slump down in the dirt. What I really need is a fix.

"You've got a show tomorrow." I think the raven is incapable of anything but laughter. "You've found what you always wanted," it says with a raucous giggle, "go show the world. Show them your waterlogged childhood."

So there I am, dirty as shit, no idea where I am or whether I can even stand, and I've got to get to town. Get a shower, get cleaned up, sleaze a few bucks, maybe lift a thing or two from the market. Not for me. For the gnawing, boiling, lethal blood running through my veins. I find myself walking along a weedy path dragging my battered Telecaster. I feel I'm some sort of beast, some immortal, stinking myth. I am the waking nightmare. Only those who walk between worlds would understand. My blood sings an icy dirge that drags me toward the highway.

A thousand hours pass along that path downhill. A thousand steps toward a thousand more. A thousand ravens trail behind me, laughing, wheeling joyfully about in the sky. A thousand years I've wandered these hills, a thousand streets I've crossed to cheat a thousand men. A thousand songs I've sang and never once told the truth. A thousand notes crying out a thousand days of anguish, but the faces remain stoic. A thousand stares that don't understand the language. A thousand shows over a thousand nights and no one can see the pain. A thousand watts couldn't bridge the chasm.

As my tired heart pulses burning poison the highway answers with its drawn out, "Hush." Each step is excruciating. I am so far from home and the daylight accuses. The shame of reality weighs me down. "Shh," the highway beckons. It is an answer, the highway. No matter the direction you choose, you're going somewhere better. As I come nearer with every slow step its whisper becomes a hum, hum becomes drone, and drone becomes roar. The canopy of the forest opens as I draw near and the path steepens. My feet barely find a step as I stagger along the path. The clearing of the road is to my left, with only the lush weeds separating us. Nettles, blackberry, and long untended grass. A frenzy wells up, I'm so near, and I batter my way through the tangle, swinging the useless guitar madly. Each thrashing arc flattens more and more of the weeds and I wobble over the large stones. A final sweep and the momentum carries me through.

Before me is the river. Grey stones in every direction. Birch and blackberry bordering everything with their pale green. The dark evergreen with its swirling fog creeping high up the steep mountains, shading the day. Rocky ledges peer down at me. The river is a roar here; all the people I've stepped on or left behind accosting me. As it flows incessantly, it tells everyone how it tore down the canyon in the spring one year, a cold, brown, frothing lash. The river flails its way past a little house on the bank and decides that little boy who lives there has too much, he needs to be taken down a notch. It reaches its muddy tentacles under the embankment. A tree falls. Hunks of the sandy shore cleave away and the river just swallows them up. It's hunger knows no bounds and the bank shears ever closer to the rickety house. A man and woman rush outside, a young boy in tow.

The rage swells and the family clamour towards the safety of the road. The splintering of wood pierces my heart. The bank gives way under the already battered house and the walls are pulled into the river. The shattering of glass is lost in the great hush. Part of the roof remains on the diminished bank. Not long though. The river wants it, needs it. The black peaks slide under the milky brown wash. We watched unable to look away from the anger, the insanity, the loss. I should have gone back for it.

It is cool down here, the air pierces my wet clothes. I have it, that broken old memory. Look at what it has become. A cracked, rusted bludgeon, draped now in thorns and ivy. It is this disheveled has been. A worthless, wooden symbol.

The guitar comes down with a ringing crack. A shard of the alder comes away with astonishing force. I lose sight of it in the glare of the sky. The wood still sings, a bitter vibration. I raise it high above my head and it comes down again on the rocks. Part of the butt shears off. The remains of the bridge spring loose and ricochets over the rapids. A final clang somewhere in the middle. I spin, and all the pain, all the rage, all the unspoken and true, all the regret send that plank up high over that bastard river. "Take it!" I roar. "All of it, take everything! Take me!" For a second, it hangs above me, a dove, a cloud, and it is whole again. A shining phosphor-white Telecaster copy with chrome hardware and a maple fretboard. Those thin strings speak a language all my own. The frets a highway to a better place. Tones of home ring out from every stop. It turns, and again it is that broken man standing at the river, once and forever lost. It drops silently down river, a soundless splash and its gone.

The midday sun cracks a smile as I walk along the river. I know my way from here. The bend is about a mile upriver, the canyon highway running along the bank and the little town just on the other side. I'm a mess. My hair is still barely caught up by a band at the back of my neck. Its crusted with vomit and strands of it stick to my face where they don't fall wildly. It feels full of sticks and mud. My eyes burn like I haven't slept in weeks. I taste blood in my mouth, a refreshing change from the bile and acid. My face feels lopsided and heavy with pain. My right cheekbone is too large and I get the sense it is dribbling down my face. There are fresh tears in my jeans, jacket, and hands, like a crow raked its needle talons over me.

I'm not afraid of those townsfolk. They can stare all they like. I've got no choice: get into town, clean myself up, and get onstage. Barrett can loan me an axe and tomorrow I can go back to the pawn shop to get my guitar out of hock. For once, however short sighted, I can see a future. This time it's not about a score. The pain of plastic, jittery blood doesn't lead me to a foreign doorstep or garage. It tries to reach back to that flood and pull me back but I walk on. The grease that flows through my veins just wants to crumple to the ground, sleep it off, wake when it's dark and creep back to town.

I am buried under the rock-slide of lies and theft. Everyone around me are those people waiting in '65 for highway crews to clear away the recent avalanche. All smashed when the mountain came down across the valley a second time.

***********

Tonight is the night. Tonight I'm going to find that sound. Tonight I'll play with such feeling, I won't need to run out the back and tie-up. I'm playing an unfamiliar guitar. It feels like the first night I got up onstage. I'm nauseous, thirsty, and I'm buzzing in tune with the P.A. I'm sweating so bad I wonder if the crowds going to think I wet myself. I probably have. We're on in a half hour.

Barrett's loaner is a nice guitar. I usually rig Grandmother's guitar with a pickup for shows, but tonight I gotta play a solid body. It feels small. It won't be the first time I've played it. Barrett brings it along as a backup in-case-of-emergency-break-this-shit-out he likes to say.

No one mentions my shiner. I look them each in the eye when I get the chance. Johnny has a little warm-up spot mapped out in the back. A few old stools and a bucket for a kick. As he thumps his muted beats out, he tries to stare me down. Kid's straighter than a prairie highway. I've never seen him more than three beers deep. Real slow, I follow his warm up rhythms. I nail that click that runs in his head.

Barrett has known me since we were kids. We used to jam in the back alley all summer long. The guy can read me like sheets. My eyes sting with sweat and I haven't touched the pint the waitress plunked down. He knows where my guitar is. The scratches on my hand and the welt on my cheek burn under his gaze. He thinks the constable ran me in; had to rough me up I was in such a state. If only.

I'll never get Shane. Bass players can like, hear with their fingers, and they taste with their eyes. Their wires are all crossed up. He shoots me a look that could be, "lose the the beat and I burn your house down," or, "shit, man, you taste good." I can't be the one to fuck things up tonight.

Its the last song of the night. We've had the sparse crowd singing along, dancing, drinking too much. We do the CCR version of Heard it Through the Grapevine like nobodies business. Great way to end the night. We can ramble and jam as the crowd sees fit. If they're getting tired of our musing, we can bring it in short. Tonight they seem to want it all. The jam goes on and the kids dance. Kai is giving us the signal to cool it off. The lights come up and we break it down. Smiles every which way in the small bar, from the old man in the corner to the fresh couples dancing the night away. I'm stoked, and frightened.

I don't sleep a wink that night. I told Barrett to keep my share. Meet me at the pawn shop at ten, I said, if I walk with that cash, I hit. I hit, I probably don't come back.

He didn't hesitate, "Done."

I writhe all night, a sweaty mess. Thankfully sleep never comes. Another nightmare and who knows where I'd end up; what animal I'd be talking to. It seems like darkness always serves to amplify your pain. When we are deprived of our sight, our nerves bristle at the slightest touch. Some long unused endings wake up and confuse the sweat on my skin for spiders crawling up and down my body.

The mornings are always cold in this part of the canyon and I'm out with the dawn. Its socked in as usual and the bench is wet. This town sleeps late. The coffee shop is open down the street, and the Driftwood is serving breakfast. A couple blocks to my left the canyon traffics picks up. A few city folk stop to eat at Rolly's, some gas up, most just fly by. Trucks, campers, bikes. None of them can find more than fuel or food. Nothing they can't get a few miles up canyon.

There is always an eagle wheeling about above the river. I know how she feels up there. I've been that circling carrion bird, waiting for the hunters to drop their riches. I'm still that bird, without all the poise and the silence. With my body tense in withdrawal I'd never be able to stay so still. I'd fall from the sky.

I'm either so numb or in so much pain I hardly notice Barrett sit down beside me. I don't want him to say anything. I don't trust my mouth to say the right things. If I open my mouth I'll beg for that cash. I'll be down at the payphone dialing the fixer, blink, and I'm tied up in an alley. I don't care that its broad daylight and there are people all over the place. Nothing could be finer. Barrett puts his hand on my shoulder.

"I wont let you fall, Freddy," Barrett says. Its too late. When you climb down as far as I have, there is no climbing back. You've got to just let go, hope there's a soft landing.

I don't say a word. I just match his eyes, stand up and walk across the street to the pawn shop. It doesn't matter what city you're in, pawn shops all smell the same. Its mothballs and dust, like a crypt for dead dreams. There is something inefficient about the lighting. Its not dark, but it is as if the light can't reach every corner. A force slows it down the farther it tries to reach. The greasy owner is always there. He is waiting for me to pull a gold chain or drill or some other obviously stolen thing. I'm empty handed and sheepishly look up at the blonde acoustic hanging accusingly. She is Grandmother's disapproval. I'm going to go clean, Grandmother. I'm not going to disappoint you anymore. Barrett takes the guitar while I scrawl my name on the ledger the pawnbroker keeps.

The bell hanging from the door clatters against the glass door as we walk back into the real world. I shoulder the guitar and pause. I feel crushed. I'm determined not to give in to the hunger. I reek of toxic sweat. The cool, gentle wind is the soft hands of a healer. A couple lines would sort me out, knock the headache down a bit.

There is a flutter of wings above us. Clicking talons on the tin flashing at the top of the wall. A raven alights on the pawn shop. He shuffles a few steps along the edge of the roof as if to get a better look at me. The big black bird drags his beak on the metal edge then cocks his head to look right into my heart. My breath catches in my throat.

"Shit, you're jumpy," Barrett prods, "its just a big old crow. You look like you've seen a ghost."

Not a ghost. More like a bully you never thought you'd see again, or a fear you thought you could control. Across the street on the bench where I spent all morning is a long black case. No one around so it looks like an easy score. I'm across the street before I realize I'm moving and thoughts are spinning out of control. Whatever it is I'll have to be quick. Grab it and fade out of view. Hand snatches the handle and I lift it off the bench. In my mind, I'm already shopping this prize around. I don't get a step when Barrett steps right in front of me.

"What are you doing? I'm not letting you take that." He's right in my face with his jaw set. I can't meet his eyes. I know its wrong to steal things. "I didn't come down here to watch you walk right back into that pit." I shudder out a breath. My shoulders relax a bit. I put the heavy case back on the bench. We both turn to look at the case.

It is clearly a brand new guitar case. From the heft of it, the guitar its meant for is still inside. The familiar stylized Fender is painted in white on the corner. We've both seen a hundred similar cases. This one is spotless. Curiosity visibly overcomes Barrett. He flips open the catches. One of them locks, but it's not engaged. The lid swings open soundlessly. On a bed of midnight velvet, a heartbreaking shape.

Like I have been staring at my old guitar for too long and the image has burnt into my retinas, this guitar before me is its negative image. A gleaming black block of wood, sinuously carved. The only white a trace around the classic pick guard. I could trace those curves in my sleep. I can hear the sound of those pickups ringing from so long ago. I can see every note on the pristine maple fingerboard. I've played each a million times. Six silver cables draw my eye to the angled headstock. Six chrome tuners glint in the morning light. Fender Telecaster in written in black on the double curve side. Two long black feathers are tied up, just behind the nut. I can't help myself, I reach for it.

"Whoa, whoa, T-Bird," Barrett grabs my hand, "you don't want your prints on this baby." I desperately do. There is not a speck of a greasy print on it. "We'll walk it down to the police station. Someone will come looking for it." He's right. I can't take my eyes off it. How could someone just leave this on a bench?

Not unusually, the street is fairly quiet. A few people wander around down by the park. Barrett carries the Fender and I have the Martin over my shoulder. No one seems at all interested in us or the guitar. In fact, no one is even walking in our vague direction. Like anything in this little town, the cop shop isn't far away. I don't like this place so I wait outside.

I've been clean ever since that weekend. I've never felt better. We are all down at the Foxes' Den, a corner of an old converted warehouse a minute up the highway. Johnny's beats drive my syncopated chords. Shane licks a smooth line with his thick fingers, and Barrett unloads a hot little melody. The stage lights come up and the little crowd gives us a solid cheer, a cat-call or two and a whistle before settling in to our groove.

I think about those strange dreams I had. Raven is a teacher of men. He is also a patron. In that old campfire story he stole for man the light of day, and fire, at the cost of his beautiful white plumage. I don't know what exactly he tried to teach me that night. He might have showed me that path that would permanently scar me, leave me blackened. Maybe he had to show me the light I've always had, tend the fire that I let burn down. He made me remember, and remember to let go of things I've lost. Most important though, is he showed me the guitar.

In the first few weeks of my recovery, I thought of that black guitar. It drove me to play on, fight my enemy face to face, and play on. I would save up all the cash I used to piss away, and I would walk out of the guitar store the richest man in Hope. I got a day job sweeping up at the grocery store. The extra money helped pay for the treatment. It took forever. Even today I could curl up in a dirty washroom somewhere and cook up a hit. A few bucks here and there would come in and go right back out to pay the bills. The pangs were there everyday. They never really go away.

The day I got that guitar, I wasn't the richest guy in Hope, I was the luckiest.

Months after we turned the Telecaster in, Constable Brown came around. Cops still make me nervous. He said he wanted to talk to me. I expected the usual, "where were you on January 15th, around 9pm?" Or, "Mrs. Carvington said she saw you pawing around in the Johnson's' garage last night." No, he reaches into his car and pulls out a rectangular guitar case. They searched up and down. No one ever reported it stolen. No one called it lost. No one walked in to claim it. It doesn't do anyone any good gathering dust in an evidence locker.

"Lots of the townspeople are talking about you. They are starting to trust you. Well, a few of us figure you've earned this, after all you've been through."

First time I plugged her in, I knew I'd come home.

I'm not going to make any claims about those two feathers tied up around the headstock. They are pretty common around here. They stand as a good reminder of a night that gets farther and farther away with every song and every show.


Thanks for reading.

Pete

Short Story - Tears of Anubis

Adom strides across hot sand, a gaunt spectre of the dark Egyptian night. He is the quiet rustling chitin of the scorpion. Every step toward the tomb is lightning in his veins, an adrenal hum.

Tonight he will feed his family.

The table has become a still life to Adom. Every day the same look of hunger on his children's faces, the same pained eyes on his wife. Tonight, the same as last, there would be only day old bread, bought with the last penny. Egypt is a tomb, his house a frieze on the wall depicting the terrible dictatorship.

As Cairo burns yellow on the horizon Adom creeps toward the old temple. “I am the asp,” he thinks. “I can sting and go unseen, I can take what Haji asked for and return to my family a provider.”

“To the west there is a temple,” Haji began as he puffed on the hookah, “Americans dig there.” Adom crests the dune, a stark rectangle breaks the horizon. “They are young students and will frighten easily.” The sky is a shimmering ink stained by ancient stars. “At two A.M., they change the watch.” A flashlight sweeps and bounces around the darkness. “You should only have one archaeology student to frighten.” Adom scrambles over the dune, the shadow of a spider. “Take this sickle-sword. Wave it around. The Americans will run away and you can take whatever they have found.”

Dalilia begged him not to go. “We will wait for the riots to end. You can find more work at the museum.”

“If I get an artifact for Haji, we will eat for years. I must go.” Dalilia waited for the children to sleep before she wept.

Treasures have lain in the Egyptian sand for generations. Tonight they should be freed for the starving destitute people of the Nile. The entrance to the Temple of Anubis glows with the blue light of a television. It throws pale, spastic shadows across the valley. Adom takes a breath, and enters the tomb.

A narrow, low hallway passes under a few long strides. The glow from the TV intensifies as he passes the into the inner chamber. Shovels, brushes, and baskets are carefully ordered around the small chamber. A man in khaki shouts and knocks over a small stand. Adom stretches out his right hand, the sickle-sword an iron tendril in the night and his face a grim sneer. The man is short, stumbling, and Adom steps far enough into the room to let him leave. A rifle. The archaeologist's eyes turn cold. The television goes out, and the black of the desert night rushes in.

The sharp click of the hammer becomes a flash and roar. Adom is blind and deaf, all his heat is trickling down his chest. A gurgle, “soldiers.”

“Yes, soldiers,” the man spits, “we replaced the archaeologists tonight.”

Pavlov's Dog postscript

Pavlov's Dog is a piece I wrote for my high school writing class. The challenge was to take the line, 'A man shot his neighbour's dog.' and turn it into a story. It was a group brainstorming lesson, with the only requirement being a short pitch to the class. Of course we did great, Corinne, Jay, Jason and I. Unfortunately, I do not recall who had what suggestions for the story.

I had every intention of writing that story, but sadly, school was not my place. I dropped out shortly after this.

The reason I would like to share this is because this whole story taught me many things. It was one of my first artistic successes, following a great fall. Later, it both stroked, and tempered my ego. It also showed me a path forward.

Dropping out of high school was a major turning point for me. I wasn't really into the way things were taught there so I was better off on my own. I did my thing. Smoked some pot, worked, read, slacked like no one's business. Freedom was good to me. But I had to go back. I knew it. I wouldn't be happy with myself if I didn't graduate high school.

I fought my way to a writing class with Kay Levings. I apologize if that is spelled incorrectly. She loved creative writing of all kinds. She was one of those teachers, proud of her 'if you can't do it, teach it' mantras. Remembering her, that joy she had, her bubbly passion for everything words. Our final assignment was a short story.

I struggled with this. I wanted to present something unique and original. If any of you write, you'll know, forcing it just doesn't work. I had this opening line for a story, but nothing more. I still remember it.

Deimos, servant of Mars, ever tumbling.

I still kind of like it. Needs something good to follow it though. At the time though, that's all I had. No story, no conflict, no structure, nothing. I had to scrap it.

I knew Pavlov's Dog was there, but I was reluctant to use it. I feel like I cheated sometimes, borrowing from my classmates like I did, but in the end, they could have easily taken the idea and ran with it. Honestly I wonder if they even remember the assignment. That being said, I took this premise from memory. There are no notes of that lesson as far as I know.

In my memory, once I landed on revisiting that outline, the story almost wrote itself. I'm proud to say it is a huge part of one of the only A's I ever got in school. I know now that it isn't much. But at the time is was a major victory for me. Things like this don't come easy for me. Following through with great ideas has always been a struggle. It showed me what perseverance looks like. It is probably responsible for getting me into art school in a roundabout way. The way it taught me to push hard to follow through, to really think a story through so all the parts come together in the end. To keep on towards a goal.

Funny thing this art school thing. One of my classmates at Cap College (now university) was taking a creative writing class as his English requirement. One day he came up to me and asked my last name. "Pete," he said, "your last name is Speers, right?"

"Yeah," I say, not knowing what he's getting at.

"My English teacher is teaching a story you wrote."

Turns out Crawford Kilian had got hold of my story and was doing something with it. Still not sure what, but having my name mentioned by a published writer and college professor was huge. Of course, I had no idea what to do with that other than to wear it as a badge in my heart. I've told a few people here and there, but I generally keep it as a little private spot of inspiration. In hindsight, I should have gone to talk to him. I suppose it could have lead somewhere. But then, I was never into networking.

My process was built on this story. Now a day, it start with some kind of vision, a moment, a few words and builds outwards from there. Sometimes it is a song I'll try to write, or a drawing that just needs more. A poem that just doesn't work. They all end up as stories. I'll share more like this as time goes on, so please, stay here with me.

Short Story - Pavlov's Dog

Pavlov's Dog

By Peter Speers, 1995

    

    A dog was barking.

    Young Boris walked down the stairs from his room to see about all the commotion. A man was shouting and someone was banging on the front door. Boris knew something terrible was coming; he could hear his mother praying for mercy in Hebrew. He peered around the corner and saw his father with his shoulder against the door. The door was beginning to break, and Boris' mother began to cry.

    A dog was barking.

    Boris awoke, startled by a dream. He walked to his bathroom and shook the ringing feel of the dream out of his ears. It was as if he was hearing something forgotten long ago. As usual, he turned his shower on. He ran the water a little warm to cope with the chill Vancouver morning emphasized by the cold sweat of a nightmare. Other than a warm shower, his routine was unchanged. He shaved, ate a bowl of oatmeal, put on his uniform and went to work.

    The snow was hard and old in early February. It was still cold enough for snow to fall, but it was a dry season. Boris watched his breath hit the icy air when he walked to the bus stop. Of course, he arrived right on time to meet his colleague driving the late shift.

    "Morning, Boris," said Mick. "The stars are up, so you'll probably be safe from fresh snow, eh?" The driver smiled and Boris returned the gesture before he seated himself near the front of the bus.

    He rode only as far as the depot, where he signed in and received the keys to the bus he had been driving for the day. He found the bus and sat down in the driver's seat. Driving a bus was a career Boris enjoyed. People were polite and had no desire to ask questions Boris would rather avoid answering. His past and his Jewish heritage troubled him. The reason he left Germany was to escape the memories and the horror. Vancouver was a place where he could blend in. His passengers smiled, paid their fares, and quietly sat down. He always read his morning paper cover to cover, only avoiding the sports section and any article that mentioned world war two.

    He was born in 1936, in Berlin. His guardians told him he lost his parents to a fate he somehow survived. They died, unknown, in a concentration camp. Boris never remembered them, and was raised by others who had survived the atrocities.

    That cold day in February was no different from any other in Boris' long career. He delivered his passengers on time and made no mistakes. He shared a few words with some of the other drivers on breaks at the loop. At the end of the day, Boris rode the bus home where he quietly ate alone. He never married. He felt he had nothing to share in his life, and he was content with his solitude.

    A dog was barking.

    Young Boris was peering around the corner at his father. His father was sweating and howling with fear. Some one was pounding on the door and shouting in a language Boris didn't under stand. The heavy wooden door splintered open and Boris' father fell to the ground. Something terrible was coming.

    A dog was barking, and Boris' mother was crying.

    The next morning Boris awoke with the familiar but somehow forgotten ring in his ears. After his shower, he managed to shake the chilling remnant of a sound, but he began to worry about the contents of the disturbing dream. His oatmeal was his usual hot breakfast. He absently stirred it as he ate, wondering in his quiet way, "what is that sound?" The sound itself was long forgotten, hardly disturbing by itself, but that it was part of his dream gave him a chill.

    His day was uneventful as usual. People came and went and he drove his bus carefully. He was silent at the loop that day, thinking about that strange sound and what it could mean. No one on coffee break saw anything odd about Boris' lack of conversation as he was consistently a quiet man. No incident interrupted his solitude for the rest of the day.

    A dog was barking, and his mother was crying.

    Boris coldly watched his father collapse under the broken front door. Two men wearing brown shirts stormed into the apartment waving rifles. Boris' mother screamed. Boris closed his eyes as the terror filled his mother's voice.

    A dog was barking.

    Boris awoke terrified. He opened his eyes expecting to see an old house from the inside. He saw his own bedroom, with its bare walls. He shuddered at the cold morning, fear sinking his heart in icy blood. Boris rose and crossed the carpet to his bathroom. He ran the water hot to rinse the chill away. He shivered, and dried himself before he shaved. His ears were still ringing with the horrible, forgotten sound. He ate, barely tasting his oatmeal.

    It was still dark when he walked out the door, but he didn't notice. In the winter, he was expecting the dark morning. The sun had only recently begun to rise before Boris was on his way to work. It was a clear morning, and Boris' boots crunched over the frosty snow on his way to the bus stop. Mick arrived driving the bus after Boris waited for a few moments, but he was lost in thought and didn't notice the time passing. Mick was almost shocked to see Boris mounting the steps on to the bus. Boris sort of half smiled to Mick and sat in his usual spot near the front of the bus. Mick just shrugged it off and resumed his route.

    Boris went home at the normal hour, just after sunset, and spotted his neighbour walking his dog down the street. They met at the walk into their common yard. "Good afternoon, Boris," said his newest neighbor.
  
    “Hello,” Boris began, "Jeremy, is it?”
  
    “Right you are, Boris," Jeremy cheerfully replied.

    They walked up to the house and waved goodbye. Boris climbed his stairs and settled in to his quiet evening.

    A dog was barking.
  
    After the sound of young Boris' mother retreated into the distance, the barking of a dog was all he could hear. His eyes were shut tight and tears were leaking through. He sat against the wall wishing for the dog's mocking laughter to end.

    A dog was barking.

    Boris was crying when he woke. It was a strange sensation. His throat was tight and sore, and his
cheeks were wet. In all the forty-odd years he could remember, crying was something new to him. He sat on the side of his bed, terrified. The ringing was horrible and he clutched his head between his hands. He couldn't make a sound.

    Boris was feeling bad that morning. For the first time in his long career, he called in to the depot. He said he couldn't make it in that day. He sat alone, brooding over his tormenting nightmare. The ring was clear in his ears, and pulsed with the beat of his heart. He cried when he closed his eyes and the ring became a strong stab in his head. The day was long and he didn't eat or shower or shave.

    A dog was barking.
  
    Young Boris prayed to his god, as his parents had taught him to do when he was afraid. The terror didn't ebb. He couldn't make a sound for fear the men would return for him. He opened his eyes and saw the wreckage of the front door to his home. Somewhere outside a dog was barking. He softly walked to the window and peered out into the street. Between the dogs boisterous barks he could hear other women scream. There was a truck in the street and his neighbours were being herded into the carrier.

    Somewhere, a dog was barking.

    Boris awoke with a sandy taste in his mouth. He was ravenous, a painful hunger that drowned out the ring in his ears. He hurried into his kitchen where he could make his oatmeal. He impatiently watched the water boil. His stomach twisted in anticipation of his morning meal. Boiled oats cooked slowly. Boris ate as if he hadn't eaten a real meal in years. He finished his meal quickly, looked at his clock and saw he was short some time. He showered in haste and neglected to shave. He threw on his uniform and hurried to the stop where Mick was already waiting.

    "Boris," Mick said, "what's going on? One day you're early, the next you don't even show? What's wrong, mate?"

    "Rather not talk about it, Mick," Boris tersely answered. His eyes shifted worriedly and he sat almost where he stood.

    A dog was barking.

    Boris walked down the stairs from his room. He was in a different house, where it seemed to him he had been before. There was a silent rushing in his ears, waves crashing rhythmically, growing louder. He peered around the corner and saw a woman, her lips moving, silently forming a prayer to a merciful god. A man struggled with the front door. The door was pounding with the ringing, quiet shout in Boris' head. He stumbled around the corner, as the sound became unbearable. The door shattered without a sound. it was all so odd; half-remembered visions and men in dark shirts were rushing in. His breath was noiseless, or just lost behind the numb roar filling his mind. Something outside was calling to him. He walked past the men carrying the man and the woman, down some stairs somehow familiar. In the yard, a dog was calling. A german shepherd was throwing its soundless voice at the people rushing and struggling.

    A sleeping Boris rose from his bed. His eyes were open, glassy, and unaware. His long, slow stride led him to a closet. Sleeping hands turned the knob and knowingly reached for an old case. His fingers went directly to the case he'd only once before opened. If he had been awake, this would have been the second time his eyes had seen this case, and what lay inside. His thumbs lifted a pair of latches, and raised the black leather lid. A rifle, shining and preserved rested in red velvet. The bolt-action firing pin of the World War Two relic was cocked, ready to fire the bullet in the chamber. Boris raised the rifle and walked to his balcony over looking the backyard. He took subconscious aim at the source of his pain. And Boris shot his neighbour's dog.