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LUNCH
by Naomi Benaron
So I’m
sitting in the park eating a sandwich – roast beef, rare like I like it – and
the sky so sharp and cold-glass blue I could lick my finger, run it along the
rim: vaarrring, vaarrring, a champagne glass of sky and this dressing I got
(mayonnaise/ ketchup/ relish) is running down my fingers making a beeline for my
elbow and my hand-knit sweater (my sister brought me that sweater from Ireland –
right off the sheep) and this guy sits down at the next table (god I wish that
baby over there on the grass would shut up she’s got her mouth full of grass and
dirt and snot and the mother so busy talking to that guy maybe the father who
knows these days - that mother don’t give a shit about her poor baby so hungry
it’s eating grass) BUT THIS GUY at the next table he’s nearly naked no shirt
just a pair of – I swear – PAJAMA BOTTOMS and his hair a Rasta rug (bet if you
took your fingers, poked and picked through that mess you’d find living growing
weeds maybe a few lettuce or tomato plants) he’s got these DOLLS a batman a
spiderman a bloated puffed out babydoll bald as a bat and naked and (of course)
a Barbie; he pulls out I’m not kidding a tea set and proceeds to set up a tea
party JESUS now that kid is crawling right over to the path that goes around the
park and those two runners with their matching shorts not watching where they’re
going (my sister’s a runner does that Boston marathon); that kid’s gonna end up
under their expensive running shoes while her mother lights up a cigarette,
could care less about that baby she brought into the world and THIS GUY having
tea with his dolls is not the tea-and-doll kind of guy more the kind you go up
to and say: have a bite of my roastbeefsandwich and he would slip over your body
with those glassed-over green as moss eyes and sswwwaaaam suddenly a knife wags
out from under your ribs and your breath sighing outta that smile in your skin
but no – he’s having tea with his dolls which is more than I can say for that
bitch of a mother smoking away and playing with the hair of that goddamn man (I
bet he’s not the father I bet she has no clue who the father is) that baby still
screaming and it’s getting into my brain a bit but she can’t unfasten her lips
from misterwonderful’s neck don’t she care that not ten feet away from her
bouncinbabygirl there’s a nearly naked man with trees growing outta his hair
just waiting for that baby to crawl over so he can stick a knife in her heart (I
was born early so early they thought I would die Peanuts they called me, skin
swirled like the skin of a nut; my mother used to tell me that story when I
cried and she couldn’t shut me up) damn that sandwich was good I could eat
another; wish I had a coke, maybe some chips with vinegar and salt - wow: there
go those runners again; bet my sister could kick their color-coordinated asses:
say - is it raining no that’s the sprinkler and the grass so green I could scoop
it up, put it on a picturepostcard like the one me and my sister sent my mother
when she took me to the Grand Canyon, well misterwonderful there is DEFINITELY
not that baby’s father that baby is brown; she has a hand on the bench where
pajama-man is having his tea party; the sprinkler is spurting on my sneakers and
that baby’s little pink suit with the snowboarding dogs is full of mud and snot
and now it’s getting soaked but she has pulled herself up and smiles at
pajamabottoms who is just waiting for her to get closer so he can reach down her
throat and tear her heart out he is bending down and the baby for the first time
is not crying she is laughing and he takes one of those little teacups for his
trashbin family and holds the damn thing with his pinky finger sticking up like
EmilyFuckinPost and smiles: spot-o’-tea says he, just like on those shows my
sister watches (I got no TV where I live it’s a halfway house but half-way to
what no one says) and that baby squeals, pushes up-down-up-down on her fat legs,
her hand on that pychokiller’s knee; finally mommy remembers she has a baby; she
and misterperfect (his pants are all crooked I know what’s inside them pants)
run over - she is yelling “GET YOUR FUCKIN HANDS OFF MY BABY” and the
psychokiller’s looking like this lady’s gonna torture him with her lit
cigarette; her boyfriend grabs that baby who starts screaming and it’s getting
into my brain real bad now and the psychokiller has his hands up like this guy
is a cop gonna hit him with a nightstick and FUCKIN PERVERT the mother screams
those runners run by like we are in some alternate universe not even visible no
the Rasta rug shakes no don’t hurt my dolls and the boyfriend pushing on his
chest, squeezing that baby so hard I’m afraid she’s gonna pop - all this noise
tying my stomach into a twist that psycho guy rocking back and forth the mother
screaming in his face her boyfriend’s the one squeezing the stuffing outta that
poor baby had no choice about getting born into this shitty world; I close my
eyes, lick my finger, run it around and around the rim of the sky vrrrrraang,
vrrrrraang filling the park vibrating trees benches business executives eating
lunch vrrrrraang ringing the edge of the sky it vibrates our bones till they
burst: all our bones and the benches and the sandwiches and the Salt and Vinegar
chips flying up into the air coming down in a pile of shards (my sister took me
to the Grand Canyon Museum; we saw the pot shards - all that’s left of those
poor Indians - I remember that word SHARD it stuck in the part of my brain that
keeps things). |