I Am the River

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This story is dedicated to Lewis Minor, Gene O’Neill, and to the surviving veterans of the war in Southeast Asia who fought and bled under their respective flags and motivations. This story is also dedicated to all those who were lost, those who lost something, and those who were left to wander. May each find their way home.

Special thanks to Paul Minor for the dossier and the plane ticket, and to Steve Berman for providing a secure home for my work. And eternal thanks to Fish for your conversations with the stars; and to Ivy, for the Martinique, and for absolutely everything else that matters in this world.

I need to hide in plain sight, here at the dead center of the world, for just a little while longer. I need to go unseen by everything looking for me, and it’s a long, distinguished list. Things want me dead that you wouldn’t believe.

So here I hide, sitting rail-straight in my chair, crooked spine upright, organs aligned and hands on knees, not moving a muscle as every fiber inside me wants to stand up and scream confessions. I tested the chair before I sat down, because I’m always careful, no matter how far gone, and found that it was a creaky chair. That was unfortunate, because I knew that when I sat down I’d have to remain still as a statue until my name was called. Don’t give away the shake of the hands, the twitch forming in the left corner of my mouth, the side that always took the punch. Any quiver will be misconstrued as something other than what it really is. I need to be invisible, as they mustn’t see inside me, and the heavy thing hiding in my right front pocket.

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