Slow Dance in Purgatory

Suddenly, the lights of another vehicle swung around the corner, and a run-down pick-up truck jerked to a halt alongside Irene's classic Caddie. Shad froze in his seat, his hand gripping the open door.

"Shaddy! Is that you, baby? Shadrach! Come help me with my bags." A thin, black woman with matted corn-rows hanging half way down her back tumbled out of the driver's seat and was pulling odds and ends out of the back of the poorly parked truck. Apparently, Malia Jasper had decided to come home. Maggie looked at her young friend and wondered what was worse, losing your mother to death, like she had, or losing her year after year, over and over again, every time she decided to split.

The door to the little house opened, and Gus's thin frame filled the doorway, backlit by the blue glow of the television. He flipped on the porch light, and even from the harsh shadow, Maggie could see the strain on his face.

"See you tomorrow, Mags," Shad sighed like he carried the weight of the world, or at least Honeyville, on his shoulders. He stepped out of the car and shut the heavy door behind him.

"Shad!" Maggie called after him, wondering if she should hang around for moral support. Shad leaned down, sticking his head through the partially opened window. “Please go, okay, Mags? Just .....just go, okay?" He pleaded sweetly, and Maggie nodded her consent.

He withdrew his head, and Maggie backed out, wishing she could help, but knowing that there wasn't a damn thing she could do. Yep, life sucked sometimes.

***

Maggie wasn’t sure what had awakened her – but the moonlight shone brightly through her open curtains, and the room was lit up in white moon glow. She rubbed the sleep from her eyes and sat up, disoriented and grumpy. She cried out in terror as a big man suddenly loomed at the end of her bed. He didn’t lunge for her or seek to silence her scream, but instead lumbered over to the cushioned window seat that jutted out below her big window that looked out over Irene’s flower garden. She knew him…he’d been in her room before.

With some difficulty, Roger Carlton knelt beside the window seat and pulled the cushion off. Inserting a key into a little lock that had been covered by the pillow, he lifted the seat, exposing a hollowed out area that looked empty except for the large book of some sort that he pulled from inside. Grunting heavily, he heaved himself up, shut the lid, and then sank back down on it. When he opened the heavy tome, Maggie could see what looked like newsprint and black and white photos.

The ghost of Roger Carlton perused the pages slowly, one by one. Maggie couldn’t see what he was looking at, but he seemed absorbed by what he studied, his face twisted in concentration. She knew he wasn’t really in her room. This was simply something he’d done many times when he was alive, and she was getting a repeat performance…again. The book he read may very well be sitting inside the window bench at this very moment, or it could have been moved before he died. Still, her heart pounded and her limbs shook as she watched him finger the words and pictures intently, turning a page only after staring at the previous one for what seemed an eternity.

Suddenly, his image winked out, and Maggie was left staring at the empty bench, its cushion restored, completely alone in her room. On shaking legs, she crept from her bed and pulled the thin cushion from the bench. She tried to lift the lid as she had seen Roger do, but it was locked tight. Maggie stood, looking out the window into the backyard at the light and shadows that colored the empty flower beds, leafless trees, and bristly shrubs in varying shades of grey. She would really have to see about getting a new room. This was the second time she’d had to wake up to Roger Carlton. She didn’t think she could stomach sharing her room with his old secrets.





8


“LITTLE THINGS MEAN A LOT”

Kitty Kallen - 1954