Copy Link
Add to Bookmark
Report
The Hogs of Entropy 0983
,...
$$$$
$$$$T""P$$$ba, ,gd&P""T&bg. ,gd&P""T&bg.
ggggggggggg $$$$ $$$$$b d$$$$ $$$$b d$$$$ $$$$$b ggggggggggg
""""""""""" $$$$ $$$$$$ $$$$$ $$$$$ $$$$$bxxP&$$&P """""""""""
$$$$ $$$$$$ T$$$$ $$$$P T$$$$
$$$"""""" " """" $$$$$$ "T&$bxxd$&P" "T&$bxx$$$$$' " """"""$$$
""" """""" """
ggg "Parallax" ggg
$$$ by -> Mr A Jim $$$
$$$ $$$
$$$ [ HOE E-Zine #983 -- 12/23/99 -- http://www.hoe.nu ] .,$$$
`"""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""'
Milo's mother left us about a year ago, and we had decided to rent
out one of the bedrooms in our house. Cash was a bit tight, and we were
aching for some company. We put an ad in the local classifieds and began
waiting.
Milo and I always liked Saturday mornings the best. We would eat
a leisurely breakfast at the kitchen table (him in his Spider-Man
pajamas, me in my bathrobe) and I'd read one section of the paper as he
cut out faces from the other section. Ever since his mother left, he
spent all of his free time cutting faces out of anything he could find;
newspapers, magazines, promotional material I had taken home from the
office, anything. Sure, it definitely started to creep me out (he had
amassed six shoe boxes full of cutouts in that year) but I certainly
wasn't one to stifle any sort of creativity. I grabbed a box of sausages
out of the freezer and Milo moved on to the current issue of Time.
"Dad, do you think anyones gonna come for the room today?" Milo
asked, faithfully, looking down at the Most Influential Leaders Of The
Century he was about to cut out.
"I hope so, son. Maybe." He had asked me this same question
every day since we placed the ad a few weeks before. I wasn't sure
whether our little routine of question-and-reassure was just to be cute,
or whether Milo really had some deep wonder regarding our potential
guest. Probably not, I decided, as he rarely ever looked up or showed
any signs of acknowledgement after I made the usual response. The
doorbell rang. "I'll get that," I said. Milo didn't look up. Still in
my robe, I opened the door. On the doorstep stood an elderly man with a
narrow face topped by combed-back white hair. From what I could see, his
entire body was covered with fine, dignified wrinkles; the parts that I
couldn't see were covered by a single-breasted black suit with a white
handkerchief in the breast pocket. Stepping up to the door with what I
noticed to be a pair of impeccably polished black wingtips, he extended
his hand. I tentatively extended my own.
"Colonel Lindsay Rodemoyer," the man said in an accent that
reminded me of Jimmy Stewart in It's a Wonderful Life. He shook my had
forcefully, almost painfully.
"Brett Botts," I replied.
"Pleased to meet you, I'm sure," the Colonel said. "I'm here
about the room."
"Excellent! Come on in." The Colonel promptly followed me into
the foyer.
He inhaled deeply several times. "This will be fine," he said.
"Don't you want to see the room first?" I asked, befuddled. He
had already withdrawn a silver bill fold from his pocket.
"No, no, that won't be necessary. Six hundred, correct? Here you
are." He handed me six crisp hundred-dollar bills and returned the
bill fold to his pocket.
"Thank you, Mister, uh, Rodemoyer," I said. "I'll show you to
your room now, if that's OK."
"You may address me as Colonel. And please do show me to my
room." We went through the family room (Milo and I were always fond of
calling it that, perhaps trying to hold together the illusion of a
perfect household as best we could) and up the stairs to the empty
bedroom. The Colonel looked around briefly, then carefully placed the
tiny black valise he carried with him on the bed.
"Would you like me to help you with your other bags?" I asked.
"I have no other bags," he said, matter-of-factly, and walked
across the hall to the bathroom. "Expect me downstairs in ten minutes."
I went back to the kitchen and sat down at the table with Milo.
"Milo, we have a guest now, and he's going to be staying in the room
upstairs."
"Oh, ok," Milo said, still looking down at the magazine. I was
disappointed in how little he seemed to care, after all the waiting. I
couldn't shake the feeling that he had been deceiving me every time he
asked.
"I could use some water, Mr. Botts," the Colonel said, sidling up
behind me.
I glanced up at him and then looked back at Milo, who was still
cutting. I don't know if he even noticed that a stranger was in the
kitchen with us. "Milo, this is Colonel Rodemoyer. Could you get him a
glass of water?" Milo picked up a cutout of a pudgy Russian man and held
it up to the Colonel.
"Stalin says no way!" Milo said in his best cute little boy voice,
only looking up for a second. I was surprised.
"Now, Milo, that's no way to greet--"
The Colonel broke in. "Mr. Botts, I will concede that your boy is
your business. However, I certainly wont stand here and listen to your
insidious red propaganda!" Before I knew it, the Colonel had sidled back
out of the kitchen and was on his way out the door. "I'm going to the
lunch counter!" he yelled back, walking out and shutting the door. I
felt sick.
"What was that for?" Milo asked, as if nothing had happened.
"I don't know. We'll see." My standard response. Something
about the whole exchange in the kitchen reminded me of how it used to be.
I felt very lonely. Snip, snip, snip. He kept cutting.
About two weeks later, the Colonel had settled in a bit, and he
became part of our daily routine. Milo and I would be in the kitchen,
preparing to leave for school and work, when he'd make his way in, take a
seat, and begin eating hastily. He'd manage to mumble the pledge of
allegiance through a mouthful of breakfast, constantly checking his
distinguished-looking gold watch. It was like he was continuously late
for something (not that I ever knew what, exactly). We would all leave
for our respective day jobs at about the same time, and I wouldn't see
him until dinnertime. I must've spent almost all of my daily one-hour
commute trying to figure out where he went, until I just plain gave up.
Whenever I would ask what he actually did all day, he'd always change the
subject and start mumbling something about patriotism or the price of
corn or something. And it wasn't as if I would figure it out on my own,
really, I could never figure out anything the Colonel did. One evening,
I was working in my office when I decided to go downstairs to the kitchen
for a snack. When I passed the Colonel's room, the door was slightly
a jar. I took a quick glance inside the room--he was sitting on the bed,
pants unzipped, with one hand stuffed firmly in his underwear. He held
his other hand up in the air, poised, as if at any moment, a fish was
going to jump out of his fly and he would have to grab it or be forced to
return home without dinner.
"Oh, Jesus! Can't you close the door?" I fumed, repulsed,
slamming the door. I walked towards the stairs to make sure that Milo
hadn't witnessed any of this. I was relieved to hear the familiar noises
of page turning and scissors snipping open and shut from downstairs.
"Hey, where ya goin', this is just getting interesting!" The
Colonel called to me from his room. I didn't dignify that with a reply.
I quickly went down the stairs and sat on the couch next to Milo. The
tiny noises were calming; I could see how he could enjoy this so much.
Snip, snip. "I'm really starting to hate that guy," I said in the dead
air of the family room.
"Why? I think he's nice," Milo said, actually looking at me for a
second. "Today, he took me to the aquarium and then we played catch in
the yard."
"When was this?" I was a bit confused.
"Before you came home," Milo said.
"Well, what did he do that for?"
"I dunno, just to be nice, I suppose," Milo said. I felt a chill
run down my spine and into my gut. "We have fun."
Over the next few weeks, Milo continued to tell me of his
afternoons with the Colonel. The Colonel himself was just as vague on
this topic as he had been about his activities in the morning. I would
come home from work every day, stepping lightly into the foyer, half
expecting to find something going on, but never actually seeing anything
that would ease my sense of paranoia. I've never been able to completely
put my fears to rest. The only thing that's kept me from getting rid of
the Colonel is Milo. He's been a lot more involved lately, and one of
his teachers at school has even called me to talk about it. Actually,
she wouldn't shut up about how striking the changes were, that's how
excited she was. For his sake, I've kept my mouth shut and slept with
one eye open. Apparently, it's paid off. The shoeboxes in Milo's room
are gone now, but he won't tell me why or how. They've disappeared just
like the Colonel does, every day after breakfast.
[--------------------------------------------------------------------------]
[ (c) !LA HOE REVOLUCION PRESS! HOE #983, BY MR A JIM - 12/23/99 ]
