homerun

I crunched across the white gravels to the old house. It was green-yellow shadow dusk. It was warm enough for crickets.

I stood at the kitchen screen door, slick with honeysuckle & sassafras & grass & cotton sheets floating on the clothesline.

I looked in. Ceiling lamp incandescence coated the room with that marvelous warmish amber that I can never steal with camera, but say sometimes. There was no vodka or screaming or pistol shot-bloody tears here.

I squeaked the door open and stepped in. The floor flickered from another room. She was to my left, finishing the supper dishes.

She was not startled. She knew who I was. She dried her hands and glided to me. “Why are you here? You don’t belong here.”

I looked down into her face. She was so beautiful. Her hair was swept red flame. Her Celt-green eyes had no dread or loathing or jade.

“I had to come here, mama. It’s all dead there. Nobody thinks about anything but nothing. So everybody moves real fast to try to prove something. And it ain’t even there to prove.”

She put fingers on my lips. She knew.

“Shush. They might hear you.” She pointed at the flickering floor. I followed.

There was a man in an easy chair. There were children scattered about the furniture and floor over bowls of ice cream. They giggled in time from something coming from the flickering B&W TV.

I smiled. I turned back to her. I whispered.

“I wish I’d brought my camera.”

She touched my arm.

“You have to go now. You don’t belong here.”

“Yes’m.”

I crunched on the gravels. “Mama...” I turned back to the screen door. She wasn’t there. I talked to the house.

“I was just gonna say, ‘Don’t drink vodka, if you can help it...’”