Читать книгу Saint in Vain - Matthew K. Perkins - Страница 7

It’s a lonely place. Full of a restless claustrophobia. Half a million residents in the whole state and one wouldn’t know where to find them. They hide mostly in small railroad towns that materialize every fifteen miles and vanish just as quickly as they appear, never more than a few thousand people in any of them. It’s as if the entire state is the work of some cosmic accountant who has hatched a scheme to launder people. And the wind always blows. It blows on it’s way in from the great plains, hits the Rocky Mountains, and blows on its way back out. So numb is any native to the wind’s steady whistle that the only time they register its existence is when it stops blowing. It is said that they always walk with a slight lean. If people could be simple, it would be these people. They don’t dream big because they don’t dream at all. Nobody knows anybody who has ever accomplished anything. The ones that make it out never speak of it again. Things that happen fifteen miles down the highway in the next town might as well happen in California. In Western Kentucky. Each town its own planet, and each planet its own factory of isolation. The wind blows, and as it blows it’s as if it carries a tune with that plays in the ear of every person there and in that tune they hear something that wrangles them into a deep, complacent state of being.

Silvio strolled through one of these towns and he heard the song of the wind. It annoyed him. Following the advice of old wisdoms, he used education as a path to a better life, and though he graduated and climbed the financial ladder, it was always unclear to him, in his own mind, how necessary or applicable any of it was in the very narrow niche of his eventual profession. He thought of his experience in higher education and the countless hours of time he spent trying to gather and twist endless strands of data in an attempt to prove that people with bigger butts are smarter, oldest siblings are perfectionists, middle children are more career oriented, the youngest siblings are the best listeners, people with long hair are more healthy, people with green eyes have better sex, Mormons have the least politically savvy minds, people with small feet are more likely to read, children who eat hummus are better at math, students who are bullied in school are twice as likely to volunteer for a non-profit organization, athletes who play soccer are less likely to be as smart as athletes who play tennis who all have a poor chance at being as smart as someone who doesn’t play anything. And people who are the youngest siblings with green eyes and small feet and long hair and big butts and eat hummus and are Mormon and bullied, whom, despite having good sex and solid math skills, are empirically the least likely of any single demographic to ever become the President of the United States of America—take it or leave it.

He arrived at the church, but on his way inside, Silvio noticed the old man sitting against the outside of the building with a Bible in his hands. He said, It’s a little hot out here for afternoon reading isn’t it?

The old man placed a marker in his book and looked up. I’m trying to get some sun and I wasn’t expecting company.

The old man took a measured glance of the neighborhood and church parking lot before saying, Where’d you park?

I didn’t.

Huh?

I didn’t park anywhere.

Well where’s your car?

I sold it, Silvio said.

Every structure comprising the small town was set in a neat grid of city blocks cleanly framed by concrete sidewalks wide enough for the comfort of three people to walk abreast. Despite that comfort, rare was it to see anybody walking here other than the adolescents who lacked the persuasion or the power to haggle out a ride from their older siblings and parents. Although the logic of an outsider would deem it possible, if not pleasant, to walk or bike to every location in a town of its size, for those who commuted with a purpose, the next destination was just as far as the one they had just come from—the grocery store is two miles from the junior high, which is three-point-four miles from the post office, which is one-point-eight miles from the elementary school, which is two-point-six miles away from home. Downtown was dead, and no one walked its forgotten pavement except for the ghosts of grandparents who used to drive their old, heavy coups here on weekend nights before the price of a gallon of gas was comparable to a gallon of milk, which then came to the front door by the hands of a man and the wired crates he carried. And now Silvio.

The old man said, I haven’t seen you for a couple of days.

I’ve been busy writing.

Writing?

Writing.

What have you been writing?

Stuff for the church.

What stuff?

Silvio leaned his back against the wall and slid down it until he was sitting next to the old man on the warm ground. His legs straightened and splayed before him on the concrete like a formless scarecrow. He said, Before someone can even be considered for sainthood they have to be nominated by a local congregation, so I’m going to need to get some support from the church. And then, farther down the line, the higher-ups will review my writings, among other things. I’m hoping they can publish it in the weekly bulletin and I can start to build a reputation.

A reputation?

Or a baseline, or a portfolio, or something. You know?

I don’t.

Silvio shrugged and then reached down to brush off a fly that had landed on his outstretched and hairy shin. The old man continued,

Sil, I told you. This isn’t what I was talking about. This saint stuff. It’s crazy.

And I appreciate that you feel that way. But you need to understand that it’s even crazier if I don’t have your help. You’ve been here for a long time and if you vouch for me it could really help out.

I don’t even know what I’m vouching for.

Just think of me like Saint Francis de Sales, only better.

Silvio. I don’t know.

Silvio looked at him for another moment and offered a short smile before reaching his arm up awkwardly to give the old man’s shoulder a soft squeeze. He rose to his feet and began walking up the hot pavement when the old man spoke again from behind him.

I’ll see what I can do.

Silvio turned back toward the church with a grin and said, I appreciate it. I really do.

Silvio turned again to walk away, but threw his hands up and faced the old man. He said, But just so you know, I was kidding about that Saint Francis stuff. I’m not a great writer or anything like that.

It’s okay.

I just wanted to be upfront with you.

I got it, Sil.

The old man offered a curt nod of his head as Silvio began to walk away again down the lonely sidewalk that, in two-point-one miles, would land him on his front doorstep.

Make lemonade, the old man called after him.

Silvio stopped. What?

I said make lemonade.

What on earth is that supposed to mean?

When life gives you lemons, make lemonade.

Where did that come from?

It’s a saying.

Well why are you telling it to me?

I’m telling you to deal with what you got.

By making lemonade?

By making something bad into something good.

What’s wrong with the lemons?

There’s nothing wrong with the lemons.

You just said they were bad.

The lemons are fine. It’s just that the lemonade is better.

Silvio raised a skeptical eyebrow. Just because you don’t like lemons doesn’t make that a saying.