Peering into my box, I processed the encounter. How about that; Coral must have said something to her boyfriend after all. And as for Trent's response; I couldn't have expected a more honest communication. It was as if he'd drawn a line with his face: Yes, I could talk to his girl, but if I laid one finger on her he'd gun me down.
In my box was a note from Hayward. Natalie, a Drawing student, had sprained an ankle on campus. I went to the site, and sure enough, the fill I'd used to replace the last stepping stone had settled, causing the mishap, no doubt.
Peering into the crater, I felt sorry for Natalie. Peering into the sky, I felt sorry for myself. "Good going, God. I do a job half-ass once in my life, and you make someone suffer because of it. And worse, give me a guilt complex because of it. No, that's some good godding there."
Normally, I would have raised a fist to the heavens--that's what leading men always do on the Big Screen, but I really liked where God was going with his firmament, there, so I let God off with the half-stern I'd just received from Trent.
I looked down, saw a squirrel working the edge of the orchard--working hard to find some earth soft enough to bury his nut.
Omen.
Yes, that's what I needed--some hard work. No, some extra hard work done extra well; that's how a guy rids himself of guilt.
I got out my wheelbarrow and shovel, made a mole-mound run that would have made Sisyphus proud. And to every low life I came upon, I gave a thumbs up. "Thank you mole for the fine fill you push up. Why, I couldn't have recruited a better helper had I dug him up myself. Thank you Doug fir for the golden needles you drop. Why, I couldn't have provided better job security had I dropped the garbage myself."
Nor did I neglect my own kind. Even the campus prom queen, on the backside of her prime, took a break from aging ungracefully to remark, "My, aren't we Mr. Congeniality today."
My burden lifted, I hauled my fill down the hill. Coming round Apolena's picnic table, I spied someone peering into Natalie's pit. Only one person on campus could do the no-no that well: Norton, the studio manager in Glass. Wheeling on down, I prepared for what was coming.
"My, my," Norton said, his eye full of alarm, "so this is where Natalie sprained her ankle."
I looked Norton square in his alarm. "I take responsibility for that." Then set about shoveling fill into the pit.
"Those stepping stones," Norton said, "I had rather liked them. Then you did away with them. Why?"
Stomping down a layer of fill, I calmly explained how I had needed the stones for my shack.
Nostalgic Norton, having worked at ACCW forever, told the story of how the stepping stones had gotten there in the first place. Years ago, when the storage area under The Center had been expanded, the contractors had spread the excavation material along the asphalt path looping down to Glass. Leif, the resourceful groundskeeper at the time, had used the excavated pier blocks to span the earth berm.
"It's all grass now," Norton said, "but back that spring, the muck would have been impassable had not Leif laid those four round blocks."
"My, my," I said, going for more fill, "that Leif; who knew he had such a way with blocks?" No, I'd thought all that Leif-speak was behind me, finally. The first two years I'd worked at ACCW, that's all I heard: Leif did that this way, this that way.
Damned Leif.
"Poor Natalie," Norton said and sighed.
Damned Norton; talking damned Leif had cleared my mind of poor Natalie.
"Poor stepping stones," Norton said and sighed. "I sure miss them."
"Why?" I said, stomping down the fill. "They weren't good for anything."
"They were good entertainment."
"Entertainment?" I leaned on my shovel. "What's entertaining about some damned stepping stones?"
"You sashaying along upon them." Norton gestured towards Glass--his office window was just down the hill. "I couldn't help observe the power those few stones had over you."
"Power?" I said, stabbing the hard earth with my shovel. "They had no power over me."
"Sure they did. Your demeanor changed entirely when you walked along upon them."
"Demeanor?" I said, exercising the wrist I'd jammed stabbing the hard earth. "No demeanor of mine changes for no good reason."
I had a vision then: Me walking along upon those damned stepping stones. Had a worse vision then: Gay Norton drooling on his office window over me, Miss Congeniality of the cabaret queens.
Going for more fill, I put extra man into my shovel--a challenge for a man with the one limp wrist. As I worked, Norton pressed on. "What puzzled me was your inability to sidestep the stepping stones. It seemed a form of masochism. You just had to walk along upon them even though the experience always left you cursing them out."
I knew better than to say anything.
"Why did you choose to walk along upon them when you knew the act would upset you so?"
That was a good question. "I don't know," I said, stomping down the fill, "but I do know it had nothing to do with masochism."
"Perhaps you like walking like a woman. In fact, I know you do. And that's what the stones gave you; permission to walk free like a woman. But then some stones closer to you got uptight, and instead of acknowledging the free woman in you, you took it out on the poor stepping stones."
"Ya, right," I said, stomping all the harder. "What now, Norton? Are you going to take me by the hand, walk me out of the closet?"
"I'm not saying your gay. Every human is a mix of masculine and feminine. Gays and straight women have come to accept whatever spread of the two they get. But you straight men, I feel sorry for you. You're like lesbians; living in denial, incapable of accepting the snatch for the butch."
On and on Norton went, lumping me in with lesbians. On and on I went, adding dirt, stomping it down, adding dirt, stomping it down. And while I stomped, I analyzed why I'd chosen to negotiate the stepping stones rather than walk around them. Truth was; I had found the stones enticing. But it had nothing to do with womanhood. It had to do with the kid in me. I mean, does a kid, coming home from school, walk around the squares chalked onto a sidewalk? No; he hopscotches along upon them.
Meanwhile, Norton was saying, "And, oh, how rich it was when you started digging them up--stamping on them, hurting your foot over them. You really had it in for those stones, emasculating you, didn't you?"
"Ah, I was just goofing around," I lied. Then a better lie came into that writer brain of mine. Going for more fill, I added, "And by goofing, Norton, I mean play-acting. Ya, see, there was this scene in this short story I was working on at the time. A scene where the protagonist gets all pissed off at this chunk of concrete. No, Norton, that's how we writer's go about nailing down a difficult scene--play-acting."
"Ya, right," Norton said, eyeing me like my mother. "And I've just been play-acting a difficult scene for the last thirty years of my life--the scene where I'm gay."
That's why we straight guys didn't saddle up with gay sidekicks. No snowing those sharp gay brains.
Desperate to make an exit, I dumped the remaining dirt on my work-site, wheeled my barrow up the hill. Nearing Apolena's picnic table I stopped. Some kind of positive buzz was calling me from the rears. Before turning, I ran through the possible scenarios. I settled on this one: Turning, I'd find Coral running towards me. Before I could say a word, she'd press her face into my chest. "Anton," she'd say, "the love I have, spilling over for you, makes infinity look like a glass half full."
I set down my empty wheelbarrow, turned to receive my fill. But no; the buzzing was just God, showing off his latest in firmament.
****
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