I will update this site soon, and once again begin writing.

It’s good to be back!!

As we turned the corner at Sandfiddler Road, I saw my first glimpses of the ocean through the dunes and sea oats.  Dad, havng seen the waters before, continued to plow his way down the sand-covered road at an excruciatingly slow pace searching for the beach house that would be our home for the next two weeks.  I longed to jump from the car and run straight to the ocean, convinced it had been there waiting just for me.

Finally pulling to a stop in front of “Sea Crazed”, all three of us ejected from the back seat, charged past the house and onward toward the shoreline.  Mom laughed and joined us finding it hard to contain her own excitement.  Without a thought in our heads, we submerged waist deep in the waves soaking our travelling clothes.  Over my shoulder,  Mom clapped her hands and laughed one minute and snapped pictures with her ever-present camera, the next.

Satisfied from the first meeting with my ocean, I returned to the sand and joined hands with Mom.  “It’s amazing, Mom.  Just like you promised it would be.”

She smiled, pulling me in for a hug, knowing that her youngest daughter would share her passion for the ocean.

For hours that week, I just sat and stared at the water ; trying to lock into my memory every sight, sound, and smell.   My preference to watch the water required me to endure constant taunting from my older sisters who assumed it was fear that kept me from joining them deeper in. 

The breezes came in waves just like the water, bending the sea oats on the dunes.  I watched the white caps breaking as far out as I could see, and I was pleased that I couldn’t see the other side; as though it somehow it was made more mysterious by the fact that my eyes couldn’t prove an end to it.

My days on the sand filled my ears with the roars of the waves and  the squeals of small children.  How lucky they were to be meeting my ocean at such a young age.  I watched them dart toward the water only to be chased away a moment later by the waves, an endless game of tag amongst two friends.

And then there was the music man.  He was staying just one house down from us and always sat on the deck in the late afternoons to play his guitar.  I found that if I spread out my blanket directly in front of my house, the breezes would carry his voice right to me.  He was melodic and sonorous and delivered my daily music  in a James Taylor- slow and purposeful- sort of fashion.  Music and the ocean became intertwined forever in my mind that summer.

The ocean had become my peace, and though I couldn’t have guessed it then, just the thought of it would bring harmony to me for years to come.

“…and in Jesus’ name we pray. Amen,” said Reverend Kelley.  He signaled for the casket to be lowered into the grave.

I tried to hold back the tear at my eye and wiped my nose with my sleeve.  My father put his arm over my shoulder and we walked away in silence.  My mother and Scooter followed.

“There’s a reception at the Ravenhardt’s house if you’d like to attend,” said Molly’s cousin Noel Carver as she approached. “There’ll be plenty of food.”

“Thank you, Noel. We’ll stop by for a few minutes,” said my father.

“Jack and Holly will appreciate it.”

“Sure thing.”

We walked up to our family car, the rusty brown Impala.

“Why don’t you hop up front Lucius? You don’t mind do you Lizzie?”

My mother shot my father a dirty look for calling her ‘Lizzie.’ “Yes that’s fine.”

We drove in silence for about ten minutes before my father spoke.
“You never know when you’re time’s going to be up do you Lucius?”

“No, I suppose not.”
“One day when you’re not looking, wham! It sneaks up on you.  Lucius, I want you to do something for me.”

I looked over at him wondering what it could be.
“What’s that?”

“Live your life for today.  Enjoy what you have in each moment ’cause you never know when the moment’s going to be over.”

He glanced over at my mother in the back seat.
“Pay attention to the important things so you don’t end up looking back on your life with regret.”

I stared out window of the Impala at the streetside piles of leaves and missed Molly.

My home is an old stone-front building on East 105th Street that the city renovated into apartments a few years ago. In her youth, she was probably stunning with her sand-colored stone walls, high arched windows, and the iron lattice-work that adorns the front walk. The developers had hoped, I suppose, that yuppies and all of their money would move in, but when that didn’t happen, they lowered the rent and let in just about anyone who was willing to live here.  And though recently painted, the lobby still emits a mixture of must and that antiseptic stench of a hospital.  It’s depressing to  live here, but I cling to that desperate feeling, hoping that it will make me a better writer.

“S’up,” the Head-nodder says to me as he brushes past.

I manage a slight smile in return, saying nothing.  I’ve pieced together his whole life in my mind with all of his drug use and womanizing.  I’ve never actually been introduced; never had a single conversation with him, but I’m certain that I know him.  In fact, I’ve never talked to any of the people who live in this building, but I have their stories, too.  I know their downfalls and worries; their backgrounds and occupations.  I know their stories because I’ve written them in my head instead of writing something useful.  At times, I wonder what they think of me, and always make it far better than what reality should allow;  the tall blond, the girl in 3B with the wonderful life.  I actually imagined them saying these nice things.  But, as I move toward the front desk, I overhear Head-nodder talking with Grey, the building manager.

“Is Molly having a bad day?  She looks a little worse for wear today.”

Immediately my cheeks are hot.  Imagine these nobodies talking about me like that!  Who the hell do they think they are?  I spin on my heels and sprint for the stairs, anxious for the safety and solitude that only my apartment will provide.

Slamming the door to extinguish the sounds of my own heartbeat pounding in my ears,  the tears come in gushes; the tears of self-pity that have become a part of my daily existence.  I swipe at them angrily and cross the room intending to use this raw emotion to write. I begin to pound furiously at my keyboard, but midway through the first page, a knock interrupts my thoughts.  The delete key removes all traces of the writing I have done, and I retrace my steps across the length of bland, worn carpet to answer the door, only to find Grey standing there looking apologetically into my eyes.

Jesus, I think he’s in love with me.  He follows me around a lot, and always wants to know the details of my life.  Grey is the closest thing I have to a friend these days.  He lets me do most of the talking and doesn’t interrupt much, so I allow him into my life, and today, into my apartment.

“Listen, Molly,” Grey starts slowly, “I’m sorry about Dan’s comment downstairs.  I hope it didn’t upset you too much.”  He waits for my reaction, and I consider letting him wait a good long time.  I take a moment to make a mental note:  Head-nodder’s name is Dan.  Returning my attention to him, I scowl at Grey’s face with his mocha skin and stubbled chin, but his kind dark eyes get the better of me and I forgive him again.

“I’m going to the store on the corner for a pack of smokes.  If you intend to follow me again, you better get your jacket.  It’s cold as shit out there today.”  I move past him without meeting his eyes and grab my black wool coat.  These endless February days are putting me in a foul mood.

At the front door, I step onto the sidewalk and notice that Grey had indeed put on his coat to join me for the walk as though that comment had been an actual invitation.

Puffing like a dragon in the cold air he says, “So, what were you like as a kid?”

I shake my head.  “What is this?  Some kind of game you want to play?  It’s too cold to think about anything but freezing to death.”  I realize that I’m purposely being difficult.  I suppose that I do this to Grey because I know that he’ll let me get away with it.

“So then think about your favorite summertime thing.  What’d you do?” Grey persists.  He always persists.

To play along, I think back to my childhood summers and immediately my mind is in Sandbridge Beach, Virginia.

I pulled the Impala out of our driveway and across the street to the Ravenhardts.  Molly stepped out of the door wearing a red jacket and a black beret.

“I didn’t know I was picking up a little French girl today,” I said as she climbed into the car.

“En Francais!” replied Molly.  She was just a little too into the French language class we shared in high school.

I put on a bad French accent and mangled the language in a way that would have caused the Frenchmen worldwide to drop their cigarettes and declare “Zut, alors!” had they heard me.

“Je ne pas know j’est peeking up ze petite francais fille, uh, today.”

Molly slapped me on the shoulder.

“Lucius!”

“Ah, oui! Tu est le Marquis de Sade!”

“C’est vrai! Je suis le Marquis de Sade, mais tu l’aime!” she declared as she slapped me on the shoulder again.

“C’est vrai! C’est vrai!”

Molly giggled and pulled the car door shut. I backed out of the driveway and headed out toward Beaver township. Molly’s cousins the Carvers had a farm out there and grew a small crop of indian corn for fall decorative purposes.

The golden autumn sun hung low in the sky over the cornfield, a slight breeze whistled through the dried stalks. The sharp musty smell of burning leaves permeated the air.

“Try to find the ones that still have ears of corn on them,” said Molly.

“How about I try to find the ones that still have ears of corn on them, Molly?”

“Hey now that’s a great idea Lucius, you’re so clever! Here’s one. Do you have the knife?”

I stealthily crept down a few rows over from Molly and did not answer.

“Lucius?”

She turned around quickly looking for me.

“Lucius, where’d you go you bugger?”

She started walking back down the row of corn peeking between the stalks trying to find me. I picked up a rock and threw it over to her right to distract her.

“I hear you sneaking around over there.”

She pushed through the stalks in that direction as I crept up behind her and grabbed her waist.

Startled, she swung around and playfully hit me on the shoulder.

“Jerk,” she said but didn’t mean it.

“Gotcha,” I said with my hands still on her waist.

“Gotcha,” she said with a flirtatious lilt.

I stood mesmerized staring into her eyes and occasionally glancing down at her lips. She looked at me with big puppy-dog eyes.

I slowly leaned forward, bringing my head closer to hers, nuzzling at first before our lips finally locked.

Electricity coursed through my body. I was kissing the beautiful Molly Ravenhardt and she was kissing me! I don’t know how long we stood there in each others arms as all time had ceased.

A sudden crash through the cornstalks broke the spell. A twelve point buck ran towards us nearly running us down before darting off deeper into the cornfield.

Crack! The report of a rifle sounded not more than fifty feet away from where we stood. Molly collapsed onto the ground never knowing what hit her.

“Molly!” I screamed as I knelt beside her lifting her head.

A man in hunter’s garb fumbled through the cornstalks and stopped dead in his tracks.

“Oh, Jesus,” he said.

My good friend has redesigned this website and I think it looks great! I am returning to telling my story on these pages.

If you’re new to this site, you’ll need to catch up on the story “I am Lucius van Dyke III.” Please click on the LVDIII link up above and follow through the archive.

Be sure to take a look at the stories my friends Izzie Crossen and Jud Pratt are writing on this web site as well!

Great to have you as a reader!
LVDIII

“Hello chum,” said the little man.
“I don’t have a dollar,” I said.
“No worry, my friend. I got my buck, bless my luck.”
“Ah.”
“Never underestimate the kindness of strangers.”
“I’ll try not to.”
“De bus, de bus,” said the little man, doing an incredibly accurate impersonation of Tattoo from Fantasy Island.

I hopped on the bus and found a window seat. The little man sat down next to me.

“I was a munchkin,” he said. “An Oompa-Loompa too. Damn orange paint made me break out.”

He reached into his pocket and pulled out a candy bar. He pulled back the wrapper and took a bite and then offered some to me.

“No thanks.”

He shrugged, carefully re-wrapped the chocolate and put it back in his pocket.

We rode in relative silence for a while as Latino ladies boarded the bus for their hour long bus trip to Bel Air, which would be followed by an hour long walk up steep hills to get to their jobs as underpaid nannies and housekeepers in the homes of wealthy Angelenos.

The bus came to a stop at Santa Monica and Highland. I looked up.

“My stop,” I said. “Good luck.”
“Luck’s the confluence of the right knowledge and the right situation. Remember that,” said the little man.
“Will do. Take it easy.”

I stepped off of the bus and glanced at my watch, ten after nine. Shit. My boss was an asshole about time.

I opened the door and stepped into the Wilcox Agency, a firm that considered itself an high power advertising agency, but in reality was so low on the food chain, it had to be content with being the company who was the primary provider of sign holders in the greater Los Angeles area.

That was my job, I was a sign holder. That is, I was one of the guys you see standing on the corner of the street with an arrow shaped sign pointing in the direction of the latest condo project, apartment building, restaurant, or massage parlor trying to encourage drivers to stop on in for a look.

I wandered to the back of the office where the meeting room was. Dan Templeton, my boss, was briefing my fellow sign holders as I walked in.

“You’re late Van Dyke,” said Templeton.
“Sorry, bus was slow.”
“Leave earlier next time.”

I wandered over to the coffee maker and topped of my travel mug of coffee, Templeton following my moves with a look of contempt.

“As I was saying before Mr. Van Dyke so rudely interrupted us,” said Templeton, “Barrister condos is a very valuable account to the Wilcox Agency. I want to see you guys working your asses off today. You damn well better be flinging those signs with gusto and flair or I’m going to nail you to the fucking wall… Especially you Van Dyke.”

With the morning debriefing over, the twelve of us boarded the company Econoline van which would drop us at our assigned corners. I slid into the back seat staring out the window as I sipped my coffee. Owen Grady, professional weasel, planted himself next to me.

Owen Grady was a twitchy sort whose bug-eyed facial expression always looked as if he was being half throttled by his own hands.

“That coffee better have a lot of caffeine,” said Owen. “Maybe that will put some energy into your performance.”
“Piss off Owen.”
“Nice attitude Van Dick.”
“Oh, you’re clever Owen. Never heard that one before.”
“You’re such a slacker Van Dick. You don’t take the Wilcox Agency seriously.”
“I hold signs for a living. How can I take that seriously?”
“You better. Mr. Templeton assigned me one block down from you and if you don’t fling your sign with gusto and flair I’m gonna tell him.”
“Great,” I said sarcastically and took a sip of my coffee.

The Econoline sidled up to the corner of Doheny and Sunset Boulevard near the eastern border of Beverly Hills. Owen Grady and I clambered out of the the back of the van. I took up my station on the north side of Sunset next to the guy who hawked Star Maps to tourists as Owen jogged down the street to his.

“I better see gusto and flair Van Dyke!” screamed Owen as he ran.

I sighed and took another sip of my coffee.

“Morning Lucius,” said the Star Maps guy in a thick Mexican accent.
“Morning Ricardo.”
“Don’ worry ’bout him. He a chilito.”
“Yeah.”

Ricardo reached under his chair and pulled out a small red Igloo cooler.

“Tamale?”
“Sure.”

Ricardo’s wife made the most fantastic tamales and would pack him off in the morning with a cooler full to sell to the locals while he peddled maps to the homes of the stars.

He opened the cooler to a big blast of steam. It was truly amazing how long those tamales would stay hot in that cooler.

I handed him a dollar and unwrapped the tamale from it’s corn husk.

“Oh,” I said, “so that’s how you’re going to be?”

I grabbed some snow from the pile alongside the driveway and quickly packed a snowball and threw it towards Molly who was now running and giggling her way across the front yard. Swish. I missed her completely.

“Nice throw,” said Molly as she packed another snowball together. Thump. She hit me in the knee.

I gathered up some more snow and started to chase her. She ran across the street over towards my front yard. She tried to jump over the snow pile left on the side of the street by the plow, but her foot caught the top of it. She flew over and disappeared from view.

I quickly ran to her to make sure that she was ok. Splat. As I crested the snow drift, she nailed my forehead with another snowball. She lay on her back in the snow giggling.

“All right, that’s it. I’ll give you something to laugh about.”

I jumped down from my lofty perch on the mound of snow to where Molly lie. I began to tickle her.

“Think you’re clever do you?”
“Yeah,” she said between laughs.
“You think you’re funny, don’t ya?”
“Yeah.”

I tickled her for another couple of seconds, let her catch her breath for a second and then tickled her some more.

“You’re evil,” she said smiling.
“Yep.”

I stopped tickling her and her giggling gradually subsided. We stared into each other’s eyes, her chestnut eyes looking deep into mine. I sensed at this point I should lean down and kiss her, but being full of insecurity and self-doubt, I could only continue to stare into her lovely eyes.

“Lucius!” yelled my mother out the front door. She did not see Molly and I behind the snow fort Scooter and I had built.

The spell was broken. I sighed, knowing in my gut that for a shy thirteen year old boy, opportunities like that are rare as ambergris. I stood and helped Molly up.

“Right here,” I said to my mother.

“Oh. Oh, hello Molly.”

“Hi Mrs. Van Dyke.”

“I’ve got to go get your dad.”

“It’s not five-thirty yet,” I said with some aggravation.

“Don’t give me a hassle Lucius. Come inside and watch your brother.”

“He’s old enough to watch himself.”

“Lucius,” she said in a you’re getting on my last nerve tone.

“Can Molly come in?” I asked hopefully.

“Today’s not a good day Lucius. Goodbye Molly. Tell your mom I said hello.”

“I will, Mrs. Van Dyke. Bye Lucius.”

“Bye Moll.”

I slouched my way back into the house and into the living room where Scooter was watching afternoon cartoons. A female black cat had just slipped underneath a freshly painted iron gate leaving a white stripe painted down her back. Pepe le Pew was immediately smitten, pursued her, all the while she desperately tried to get away this amorous and odorous fellow.

“I’ll be back in a little bit,” said my mother.

Twenty minutes later, I heard the car pull up the driveway. My mother came in without my father.

“Lucius, come give me some help please.”

I sighed heavily and pulled myself up from the couch where I had so comfortably been watching cartoons. I walked outside to the garage with my mother to see my father passed out in the passenger seat of the car. I opened the door and shook his arm. He wearily raised his head and looked at me.

“Lucius, m’boy, you’re old man’s not feelin’ well.”

I could smell his whiskey steeped breath as he spoke. He reached out his arm, looking for help getting out of the car. I supported him as he wobbled to his feet. He put his arms around mine and my mother’s shoulders, much like an injured football player being escorted of the field would. We eased him down the basement stairs to his office and deposited him on the green glider in the corner. The damp coolness of the basement always seemed to ease his hangovers.

My mother and I went back upstairs. I could tell that she was holding back tears, trying to appear strong in front of me.

“I’m going to go lie down for a while,” she said.

“Ok.”

“I don’t know how much…” she started to say before reconsidering. She put her hand on my shoulder and then retreated upstairs.