The End of the Beginning
Strong arms hugged my body, and soft lips kissed my forehead. I opened my eyes to gaze into a pair of deep brown eyes with gold flecks in them. I wanted to wake up every morning to the sight of those eyes. I wondered if I was going to get to.
Lacas cleared his throat with a gentle a-hem. “Did you dream all that with me?”
I nodded that I had.
“You’ve lived a hell of a life, Marvin.”
I didn’t know what that meant, so I asked. “Is that good or bad.”
“I don’t know yet. I’ve got to think about it. I also still have to hear the rest of it. You only just started your trip. I guess at the end is when you ‘surrendered yourself to the world,’ like you keep saying.”
“It’ll be two more weeks before that happens. Tom is going to get much worse. That day in Detroit was the last day he was whole. Every day after he was less and less.”
Lac shook his head against the pillow. “No more tonight. You’ve told me so much, I can’t absorb anymore. Let’s get up and eat. I’m hungry. After we eat, I want to fuck again.”
I kissed the end of Lac’s nose and smiled. “You’re such a romantic.”
“Only when I’m horny!” He teased.
We laughed together and separated to get out of bed. I started to pull a pair of shorts on over my jock, but Lac complained. “Oh, booo. You can eat in a jock. You always eat me in a jock. Let me admire your ass while we have dinner.”
I couldn’t argue with Lac’s reasoning. I abandoned my shorts and led my boyfriend downstairs. Sam got up off the couch as we reached the main floor. He stretched and yawned and whined for attention. I stopped to pat his head and ruffle his face. “Did you have a nice nap? Did you? Daddy and Uncle Lac had a nice nap too.”
Sam barked and wagged his tail as I scrubbed my hands over his head and played with his floppy ears. “Are you ready for supper? Are you?”
Sam barked again and tried to lick my face. I held him off as best I could, but I still had to wipe a streak of dog slobber from my cheek and chin. The three of us went into the kitchen so I could get dinner ready.
I took the coffee brewer down first. I prepped it and put it on the electric stove burner. I opened the fridge and had to search a for a package of steaks I’d bought the previous morning. I seasoned them when I brought them home, so they were ready to cook. I moved things around on the top shelf until I saw the package at the bottom of the fridge. It had gotten shoved to the back by the tray of dog casserole and had fallen behind the shelves.
I backed out of the fridge to push Sam out of the way. He hovered like he usually did. Every time I opened the door, Sam would come to look. He knew his food was kept inside, and he would make a nuisance of himself until I either fed him or ran him off. I didn’t bother with the effort of trying to get him to go across the room and sit. He wouldn’t want to, and I didn’t think it was necessary to make him. Instead, I held him out of the way with my back and tried to retrieve the steaks.
I gave Sam one more gentle shove with my hip, then bent low and reached all the way to the deepest recess of the fridge. Just as I closed my hand on the steaks, the feeling of hot breath and a cold, wet nose on my hole sent a lightning bolt of shock up my spine. I yelled and jerked and smacked my head on the upper wire shelf. The shelf jumped and the pitcher of lemonade tipped over and spilled. The ice-cold lemonade splashed over my head and down my back before I managed to extricate myself from the refrigerator. I rounded on my dog with shivering anger. “DAMNIT, SAM!”
The big dog yipped and ran like I was going to murder him. He launched himself through the screen door and down the steps to cower in the backyard. Another noise from somewhere in the kitchen captured my attention. I turned toward it with my rage cocked and ready to explode. Lacas was seated at the table. His hands were tight fists on the Formica top and his face was purple from trying not to laugh.
The absurdity of the situation got to me, and I allowed myself to see the humor. I didn’t laugh, but I permitted Lac to. “Oh, go ahead!”
My boyfriend roared with deep barks of hysterical laughter. He even pounded the table with his fist while tears of amusement ran down his face. I got a pot of water, a dishcloth, and a couple towels to clean up the mess. I bent double to wipe out the back of the fridge and Lac wolf-whistled behind me. “Sam has good taste! I wish I was a dog.”
I decided to play along with the joke…a little. “I wish your tongue was as big as his.”
Lac chuckled. “Me too. I’d do my best to tickle your tonsils from between your cheeks.”
I backed out of the fridge and patted both sides of my face with my palms. “These cheeks?”
“You know which ones I mean.”
Lac got up from the table and went to the pantry closet to get the mop. He wet the mop head in the sink and made the mess on the floor worse by pushing the lemonade puddle around instead of sopping it up. I stopped him from his incompetent cleaning and tossed an old towel onto the floor to soak up the mess before I let him mop.
I finished in the fridge and went to the sink to rinse out the dishcloths and to wring the towels. I also snatched the coffee from the stove before it boiled over. I set the coffee aside to rest and I threw the mess of lemon scented cloth on the drainboard. Freed from my tasks, glanced over to see how Lac was making out with his mopping. The sight of the big, jockstrap wearing bear as he performed the domestic task struck my sense of humor.
I laughed because I couldn’t help it. Lac knew I was laughing at him. He teased me by adding some theatrical poses to his mopping. He balanced on one foot and pushed the mop away while he stretched his arm and other leg out behind. He twirled around and brought the mop with him like he was a dancer or maybe a figure skater. For his last antic, he deliberately dropped the mop handle and squatted down to pick it up. He meaty ass cheeks parted, and his permanently swollen gash pouted as he pushed his hole out to entice me. My mouth watered at the sight.
I decided to take advantage of Lac’s playful mood. I soaked a fresh dishcloth in warm water and offered it to him. “OK, you’ve had your fun. Now come over here and wipe the sticky mess off my body.”
Lac accepted the cloth and started to clean my back. “This is strange. Usually, I’m working to make you into a sticky mess, not clean you off.”
“We’ll wallow in each other later. For now, just wipe the sugar off me before it dries.”
Lac cleaned my back and let his wandering fingers tease my hole before I reminded him that we still had to eat. I rinsed my hair with the sink sprayer and let Lac help me dry it. With the mess finally dealt with, I went back to cooking dinner.
I made some roasted vegetables in the oven and seared three steaks. I set one very rare steak aside for Sam and threw the other two in the oven to come to temperature. When the food was ready, I put everything on the table and went to the door with Sam’s steak to lure him in from the yard. It took some coaxing. The way the big dog skulked up the stairs and into the house, any onlooker would think I beat him on a regular basis. I’d never raised my hand in anger to Sam, or any of the other dogs I had over the years. Sam was particularly sensitive to anger. He always tucked his tail when I shouted.
“Come on, you big baby.” I gently scolded the cowering giant. I patted Sam’s head and stroked his back and pretty soon his tail was up and wagging again. “Yes, I forgive you.” I served Sam his steak and watched as he tried to inhale it. He couldn’t devour the hearty piece of meat as easily as he usually did his dog casserole. He had to chew a bit. I left him to it and went to have my meal with Lac.
The steaks came out well and we enjoyed them. Lac complimented my cooking, but asked why I bothered. “There’s plenty of premade food to eat. Why do you cook every meal?”
He was right. Science and technology had long ago delivered on the promise of plentiful, healthy, easy to prepare food. The microwave oven of the past had been improved to become the best and most efficient way of heating ready-to-eat meals. The food was restaurant quality and needed no preservatives. Because of the advanced packaging technology, it didn’t even require refrigeration to last for years at a time. My reasons for cooking had nothing to do with the convenience or inconvenience of the task.
“I like to cook. It was the first thing I learned to do for Tom. When he brought me here to live, the deal he made was that he would look after me if I helped around the house. The first year or so, there wasn’t much I could do because I was too small. I dusted the furniture and vacuumed the carpets. I emptied his ashtrays. I gathered the laundry, but I was too small to use the machines. I felt like I wasn’t contributing enough. Tom didn’t cook at all. He either didn’t know how or he couldn’t be bothered. We ate all our meals in diners or take out. Tom used to bitch about how much everything cost and how lousy the food was. I wanted to do something to help, but I didn’t know how to start.”
Lac didn’t understand the problem. “Couldn’t you just ask your implant for a recipe?”
I almost laughed at the absurdity of his question. “There were no implants. There were almost no computers. There was certainly no internet. The System was in its infancy. Back then, if you wanted to know something, you had to go to a library and look it up in a book, or you had to ask someone who did know.”
Lac shook his head in amazement that such a time ever existed. “What did you do?”
“There was a neighbor lady, Miss Carmela Mastrangelo. She was a middle-aged spinster who was sweet on Tom. Tom paid her no mind, which was a shame, because she was a nice lady. I think if he had been a slightly different man, the two of them could have been a very nice couple. Anyway, Miss Mastrangelo used to send food over for me and Tom. She was a good cook, so I asked her to teach me. She was thrilled to have an eager student. I think she hoped to snag Tom through her kindness to me.
“She would eventually teach me everything she knew about food and cooking. In the beginning, she taught me to make breakfast, simple things. Her first lesson was scrambled eggs, toast and coffee. She had a coffee brewer like the one I use now, and she taught me how it worked. She even found another one at a thrift store and bought it for me to use here.
“Tom didn’t know I was taking cooking lessons. He thought I was spending time at the woman’s house because she was nicer to me than he was. Tom always thought he was a prick. He was gruff, and he could be hard to get along with, but he was really the sweetest man I’ve ever known. Miss Mastrangelo was very nice, but she wasn’t nicer than Tom. She just had a skill I wanted to learn.
“I was glad I didn’t have to keep the secret from my father for very long, because I think it would have upset him if I spent too much time away from the house. I can still see the look on his face when he plodded down the stairs with his eyes barely open on his way to the corner store to get watered down coffee and breakfast sandwiches. Here I was at the stove, just finishing the eggs and watching the coffee brew.”
“He was surprised?”
I laughed at my memory of Tom’s reaction. “More like afraid. He thought I was playing around. The stove was gas back then. The burners put out real fire. It could be very dangerous. Tom ran over and scooped me off the stool that I was using to reach the stovetop. I had to beg him to let me down so the eggs wouldn’t burn. I served the eggs with buttered toast and jelly and hot fresh coffee.
“Tom was so pleased. I was ecstatic that I was able to do something for him that he either couldn’t or wouldn’t do for himself. Ever since then, I’ve enjoyed cooking. I eat the prepared stuff sometimes. I don’t like to because the processed food of the past was basically poison. My memories from back then make me shy away from the modern stuff, even though I know it’s good. Whenever I can make the time to cook, I prefer to cook.”
Lac played with his fork. He rattled it against his plate and pushed a piece of fat around that he hadn’t eaten. He asked a question he obviously knew I wouldn’t like. “How much do you do for Tom?” I started to answer, but he talked over me to clarify his question. “You said that he died in 2007. It’s 2525. Tom has been dead for over five-hundred-years. You’ve had seven lives since then. This is your eighth. I mean, I love my father. He’s a great guy, but I don’t do a single thing as part of my routine that’s a tribute to him. Why do you still do things for Tom?”
Lac had been right to be cautious with his question. I didn’t like what it implied. I got up from the table and snatched his plate away. I bustled in my anger and did a quick and rather noisy clean-up from the meal. I poured the coffee and put a mug of it in front of each of us. I put the sugar bowl on the table. I also added a clean ashtray. I pointed at the small, clear glass tray. “I put this ashtray on the table every single night I eat in this kitchen. I do it now, just like I did then. As long as I live and as long as I have access to a physical body, I will put this ashtray on the table.”
Lac saw that I was upset. He tried to apologize for his question. I didn’t let him because as much as it upset me, he had a right to ask it. As someone who wanted to share my life, he had the right to know about the ghost he would have to live with.
“One day in 1989, there was an eight-year-old boy. The boy was nameless and friendless. He had never known kindness or love. To him the world was a terrifying place of shouting and pain. The boy had no future. He looked forward to nothing because he didn’t think anything good or kind or positive would ever find its way into his life. When he unlocked the door to find a man with a gun in the kitchen of the house he lived in, he thought his short life was about to end. The funny thing was, he didn’t even care.
“To his surprise, the man didn’t kill him. The man invited the boy home. He gave the boy a name. He bought the boy clothes and shoes and a toothbrush. He took the boy to the doctor and the dentist. He treated the boy with kindness and respect. He told the boy he was good. He offered the boy praise. He showed the boy love.
“I don’t take anything away from your father. He helped to make you, and he raised you and you should be grateful to him. You should love him and show him the respect he is due. Tom Collins is not the same as your father. He found me like someone would find a broken toy in an alley. He could have shot me and left me there and never had a second thought. It would have surprised me less if he would have. Instead, Tom gathered me up in his big, strong hands and he brought me home and he showed me a world that wasn’t always mean and awful. So, if I tend to like the things that he liked, or do the things that he praised me for, or if I put this ashtray on this table every night for a thousand or even ten thousand years, I could never even begin to repay the gift Tom gave me.”
I drank from my coffee cup and burnt my mouth and swore. Lac looked towards the ashtray. He reached for it but stopped. He sought my approval before he touched it. “May I?”
“You may.”
He picked up the transparent tray and ran his hands over the glass. His thick fingers explored the grooves where Tom once rested his cigarettes between bites of food or when he wanted both hands to read something. He turned the tray over to look at the bottom. His expert eyes found a number in the glass. “Made by machine.” He observed.
“They were everywhere back then. You could have one for very little money. People would steal them from hotels they stayed in or restaurants they liked. The nice ones were given as gifts or used as advertisements. Some ashtrays were decorative. Most, like that one, were merely functional. Tom never had any decorative ones. He was a simple man. He smoked strong cigarettes with no filter. He lit them with a plain, metal lighter. He extinguished them in plain glass ashtrays, like that one.”
Lac set the ashtray down on the table. “Would you tell me what happened to him?”
I didn’t want to talk about it, but Tom’s fate was part of the inevitable conclusion to my story. As sad as it made me to remember, I owed that part of the story to Lac, just like I owed him the rest of it. “He died. The tumor in his head ravaged his brain. He lost pieces of himself daily. I knew the end was near when he forgot how to smoke. We were in Washington DC, the last stop in our nationwide search for the hackers. We’d been to the data center and found nothing. Poor Tom was in pain. His head ached constantly. We were in a conference room, which he hated. The computer team was trying to figure out why they found no trace of the hackers at any of the facilities we searched.
“The urgency was rising because the Chinese and the Russians found out our weapons were offline. They were plotting to take advantage. The Department of Homeland Security was ready to bring the weapons systems back up and take their chances with the hackers rather than risk a coordinated attack from the other two powers. ‘The nerds’ as Tom and I called them, had been round and round. Tom got fed up and shouted, ‘maybe it’s the fucking computer itself. It’s the only thing it can be at this point. We’ve been all over the Goddamned place. You can’t find a fucking thing. No one can. There’s no one left it could be!’”
I picked up my coffee cup in both hands and drank from it again. The coffee was still hot, but not enough to burn. I drank some of it and set the cup down. “The younger members of Jack’s team looked at Tom like he was crazy. Jack asked if I would take Tom outside for a cigarette. I escorted him out of the building into the parking lot. Tom didn’t light up like he usually would as soon as he saw daylight. He just stood with his hands in his pockets. I waited and waited, but he didn’t light up. Finally, I asked if he was going to smoke. He didn’t know what I was talking about. I had to coach him to smoke like it was his first time.
“I wanted to cry. The entire time I knew him, Tom smoked like a machine. His face wasn’t complete unless it had a cigarette in it. I knew that if he didn’t remember his lifelong habit, he had very little time left. I got nicotine patches for him to keep him from going through withdrawal and stayed close to him for the rest of the day. He died later that night in the room we shared. I started to stay in the same room as him, so I’d be close in case he needed me. We had a good meal in a nice restaurant and went back to the room to watch television for a while. When I got tired, I suggested we go to bed.
“Tom hugged me like he knew he was saying goodbye. He thanked me for looking after him and told me I was a good boy. I tucked him into bed and went to my own bed to rest. I was still tossing, trying to get to sleep when he suddenly shouted. He sat bolt upright and held his head. He cried out in pain, then he slumped over sideways. When I checked on him, he was dead.”
I drank the rest of my coffee and waited to see if Lac had anything to say. He didn’t seem to. I finished that part of the story. “I didn’t cry. I felt numb. I felt like nothing mattered. My hero, my champion, my father was dead. I did what I had to do. I did what Tom would expect of me. I squared-away his death like he always squared-away his life. I made the phone calls and dealt with the officials. I took the next day off from my job with the computer team so I could arrange to have his body shipped back to Philly.
“I called the funeral home who held the contract for his end-of-life planning. They offered their condolences and agreed to receive the body when it arrived. Since Tom had no friends to speak of, there was no funeral planned. The funeral director said he would have the body cremated per the instructions Tom left, and I could pick up the ashes in a week. I said that was fine. I half figured the world would end in a nuclear holocaust before the week was out, so I didn’t think it mattered.”
Lac interrupted my sad speech with an observation. “But it didn’t.”
I didn’t know what he meant. “What?”
“It didn’t end…the world, I mean. The world didn’t end because here we are.”
I agreed. “You’re right. The world did not end.”
Lac jumped to the obvious and correct conclusion. “You saved it, didn’t you?”
“Yes, I did…but that’s a story for another time.”
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