THREE KNOCKS A KNOCK on the front door. I answer it, but there is nothing on the porch, only the old rocker moving slightly in the late night breeze, and the shovel in the corner. Back in the kitchen, putting leftovers into Tupperware containers, I think of how she used to regard meals as house keeping. “Finish the ravioli so I can clean the damned dish.” There’s a knock on the door and when I answer - again - there is nothing, no one. Probably some kids out to vex an old man. “Very funny!” I yell into the night. “Ha ha!” The wind has picked up and the rocker is moving a bit faster, making the floorboards creak. Leaves are shuffling against the front steps. Fog thickens the air. I return to the kitchen and see hundreds of ants on the counter. I spray them with Windex, then wipe up the dead, crunchy as coffee grounds. Some are still alive and have dropped to the floor while others crawl on my hands and up my arms. I brush them off, but a few are on my neck and under my shirt, scrabbling across my chest and belly. I slap at myself like a person possessed until their movements cease, then get the broom to sweep the floor. There is another knock. “Enough already! Armed with the broom I open the door. No one. The wind is angry now, stronger than before, and the rocking chair has a life of its own, moving back and forth like a piston. The shovel is gone. I step off the porch and stir the bushes with the broom handle, then poke it into the red leaves of the maple at the end of the walk. I look up and down the road, but the illumination from the old lights falls off just beyond the darkened houses on either side of mine. Across the way the cemetery is a murky cluster of shadowy headstones and drooping tree branches. “They must be in there, I say and cross over.
Posted on: Thu, 31 Oct 2013 13:24:57 +0000
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