Men rise from one ambition to another: first, they seek to secure themselves against attack, and then they attack others.
- Niccolo Machiavelli
The wildflowers we grew out back this summer died overnight. I pulled up this morning after I took Milla to school and I could see it had happened when I was paying attention. Their deep pinks and theatric yellows have retreated, and in their place we get those palish hues that come with having your throat slit just as the party is beginning to get interesting. I stand there in the yard taking pictures of them with my phone.
No one is around. The morning air is sharp, bracing. I whisper at a Black-Eyed Susan.
See you in Hell, amigo.
There is no response.
Until there is.
Tell my mother I died with my face staring at the enemy, mutters a small, light voice.
I try to pick out which flower said that but how can you tell, you know? There’s a bunch of different ones. Was it the Susan I was talking to or was it some other flower? I guess it doesn’t even matter that much. I consider trying to take a video, start the discussion, make a TikTok or a story on Instagram, but then I bail on that. People would think I faked it. Maybe it’s AI, they would suggest. No one wants to believe in anything fantastical or magical anymore.
Even a lot of the God people are starting to have their doubts.
I punch a Susan on my way towards the house. I give her a black eye even as she lays there in death. It’s not because I’m mean or crazy or anything like that either. It’s just that I am a little sad because the flowers are going.
I am mad at them for leaving.
So I sock one, wild nature blowing through my bones.
Then I head inside, eat three Kit Kats from Piper’s Halloween sack, and come upstairs to write this.
_____
In the Walmart the other day, I was pushing another cart with a nasty wheel/ the squeaking pissing me off/ all the frozen pizzas and the packed lunch chips and the soda for Halloween and the stuff for meatballs, all of that making me unsure/ uncertain/ making me nervous and embarrassed and feeling self-conscious even though everyone else in there was buying whack shit too.
Old lady with canned cat food and Saltines and nothing else. I picture her spreading the Fancy Feast on a few crackers on a nice china plate and then hobbling real slow into her musty front room and sitting in her burnt sienna chair and eating them alone as she watches Fox News.
Mexican dude, young, no English maybe, buying two pairs of cheap kids sneakers. I have bought these same ones a lot in my life. You do that when your kids are young and you are poor and there is no sense in buying nice kicks when they will be outgrown and destroyed before two months is up. I feel a solidarity with him and I try to catch his eye but he doesn’t care. He probably thinks I’m hitting on him. I consider buying them for him/ telling the cashier to include his two pairs of sneakers on my tab, but I don’t have the courage in the end.
What would he think?
And what if it’s an insult to him, you know?
He might have been saving a while to buy these things for his kids and suddenly here comes what? Fucking Daddy Warbucks at the checkout? I hardly have a pot to piss in myself, so what business do I have throwing some unsolicited charity at this stranger next to me? He could take out a phone and start recording me trying to take care of his purchase and shazam! The next thing you know, I’m all over X: public enemy number one: husky white 50-something cookie-cutter cookie-eater guy in Walmart trying to belittle a hard-working young immigrant with the strange mad condescension so common in tragically unaware American bleeding hearts.
It’s not easy pulling off overt kindness. I’m telling you, man. You have to look in all the mirrors before you pull the trigger on these kinds of things. Otherwise you can end up shooting yourself, or even worse, someone else, just because you got confused by all those damn reflections all at once.
I guess what I’m saying is this.
I should have just bought the sneakers for the guy. Why??! Because it’s better to get burnt at the goddamn stake for good intentions instead of being skinned alive because you’re so fucking afraid.