mOsbURAnD

There was a patch of dead grass in the yard that seemed to control the entire universe. It was rumored that a rabbit had died there, the victim of its own cruel, self-loathing paws. There were other rumors regarding the patchy area, also involving rabbits, most of them purely fiction. Completely removed from this location by two continents, a pair of figures slowly draw our attention. One male. One not. One female. One not.

"How are you, Leopold?" asked Mrs. Shea, stealing the clothing from a neighbor's washing line.

"I am not well! I believe my son is dead. I learned the news of his death only after sleep last night, where I received a telegram in a dream brought to me by a one armed man engulfed in flames."

"Fool," sneered the now seconds older Mrs. Shea. "You have no son!"

"Woman," foamed Leopold, "you are mad. Your words make no sense. What language are you speaking?" He recreated the angry face he'd seen the preacher make on numerous occasions when he'd intentionally trod upon his feet in the market.

"It's one of those dead languages, much like your imaginary son," she replied mocking him, her left hand running through her hair, her right hand rummaging and stealing his wallet, and replacing it with the wallet of a much shorter man.

"I'm planning a trip to see him. To say goodbye. A final embrace. Perhaps to give him a few suggestions pertaining to his will. Maybe some drinking. Can the dead still drink?"

"Of course," answered Mrs. Shea, the lines in her face resembling a map of the Mediterranean. "You've heard the expression, 'Excuse the mess, drunken ghosts!' before, have you not?"

He eyed the woman suspiciously, then with extreme lust, then again with suspicion. "I can't believe my father ever had sex with you."

There was a scream of intense anguish in the distance, like the desperate cries of a murder victim, or someone experiencing excruciating pain. Perhaps someone had clumsily injured themselves chopping word, or had fallen from a window. Could someone have splattered scalding water on a small child? Neither of them acknowledged the sound. "A tree falling in the woods," thought Mrs. Shea, repeatedly.

"I'm off. I hope I shall survive the journey in this downpour."

"Madness! There's not a drop in the sky!" There was a moment, filled with a strange unnamed emotion on the part of Mrs. Shea. A combination of fear, and pity, and jealousy, all mixed in a sea of indifference. She offered some advice. "You look ill-equipped for a long journey. Might I suggest you bring a watch? The 'ticking' sound becomes quite edible in desperate situations."

"I gave my watch to a blind man. For companionship, you old bat!" He turned his back.

"Rain?" thought Mrs. Shea as she walked away, "He's gone nutty." As she walked, wetness dripped from her drenched dress.

Leopold rezipped his zipper, and walked away.

The following morning Leopold began his journey. He had plotted out his travel path the previous night very scientifically by tossing playing cards into a hat. "Better than a map," he'd muttered. Truth be known, he used that phrase often, most always in a non sequitur fashion.

Onward he walked, his mind firmly focused on the image of his son. He thought back to that one special Christmas. Such fond memories. So many obscene gestures. It was nearly enough to cause him to become choked up. Instead, he turned his attention outwards. The very second he'd done so, he regretted it. The world created an emotional stew within his being, one both spoiled and tasteless. He made a point of sharing this angry concoction every chance he was given.

"Out of my way! I am a father in search of his dead son!" he'd shout out at random intervals. In daylight the shouting was directed at passing pedestrians. At night it was aimed towards people from afar, along with the accompaniment of a fistful of rocks flung through their bedroom windows.

To lessen the difficulties of foot travel, he'd brought along a walking stick. This served him well, as he bored easily, and found within the stick a source of cruel amusement. He indulged himself in whacking the backsides of small children, and using it to lift ladies' skirts. During such occurrences, he excused himself, placing the blame fully on the walking stick, adding that he himself had been forced to suffer under its perverse guidance. At that point, the stick, feeling betrayed, stopped speaking to him.

When overcome with hunger, he delighted at discovering the abundant untapped food supply tucked away within the follicles of his short beard. It was not only the abundance, but the variety of foods his beard contained that created in his mind a futuristic vision of a new kind of grocery store.

"Leopold, you bastard!" shouted Victor at the top of his lungs, although the men were standing virtually side by side.

"Why do you shout? Are you trying to scream out an inner demon?"

"My apologies. I've been looking through microscopes all day. My eyes have yet to adjust. How have you been?"

"My son is dead," said Leopold.

"You have a son? Since when?" asked Victor, his suspicions raised by the way Leopold tightly gripped his lips with his right hand as he spoke, rendering his speech indecipherable.

The grief stricken Leopold continued, "And on the eve of his birthday, no less. He was nearly at that age."

"What age is that, pray tell," asked Victor, suddenly filling the area with a fart reeking of mayonnaise, "that age where the imaginary die?"

Leopold gave no answer, as he busied himself picking his nose, mostly to block the smell.

I'm feeling rather uncomfortable around this nose picker, thought Victor.

Shut up! Everyone picks their nose, you silent farter, thought Leopold.

"Come, we shall go to my piso to mourn the loss of your son over vodka."

The men walked half the way there before continuing to walk the other half. The sun spat down at them periodically, causing both men to shake their fists angrily skywards on more than one occasion.

"Well, let us begin," said Victor on entering his piso. "It is a fresh bottle. A gift from an admirer. A nurse. Let us say I did some healing upon her!" He laughed, and filled two glasses. These were jointly consumed.

"Bah, this vodka has soured," Leopold wheezed as he spat out the words. "Are you sure she's enamored? Perhaps she's planning your slow demise? My stomach feels as though full of wild birds. LARGE ones!"

"Take your sickness outside! I don't want you to let such large creatures out indoors, you ingrate!" spoke the slightly balder Victor, letting loose an angry bird of his own in Leopold's direction.

Once outside, Leopold spotted a horse. A spotted horse.

(He also saw a man sawing wood near a see-saw by the sea, but it left no impression upon him. He hated wordplay and any sort of pun)

The sun continued spitting. Sometimes rather large repulsive chunks.

"Ahh, no need to continue traveling by foot!" shouted a drunken Leopold randomly while consuming his walking stick, his gaze fixed upon the drastically blurry image of something horse-like.

Leopold staggered towards the horse. The horse looked away, alarmed by this invasion of personal space. Leopold took the gesture as bashful flirtation on the horse's part.

"I demand you take me to my dead son," Leopold slurred, the words dripping slowly from his mouth like so much excess tree sap, but taking on the appearance of yesterday's dinner in a liquefied vomited form.

He mounted the animal.

"Sir, we are not a real horse. Merely two men dressed as such in the hopes of winning the top prize at a costumed event," explained the man in front, although the horse's lips barely moved.

"I only do it for cheap sexual thrills," whispered the man in back quietly to himself.

"That makes no never mind to me," said Leopold, applying a swift ankle kick into the sides of the creature he now straddled.

Randolf, the man portraying the hind quarters, took the brunt of this blow, mostly applied forcefully to his head area. He suffered afterwards from acute hearing loss and excruciating migraines. Yet, he somehow found the injury enjoyable in the moment.

Away the creature stumbled, its four legs horrendously out of sync, cursing and grunting from personal injuries.

Its muscles ached from the burden of supporting not only Leopold's weight, but that of the cement blocks he'd discovered nearby and taken to carrying with him. "Souvenirs of my journey," he'd told himself.

After a full day of travel, the horse-suited men collapsed, unable to travel any further.

"Are we there?" asked Leopold as he dismounted and scanned the area. The costumed men, unable to bear another moment confined, proceeded to remove their horse attire.

"It feels good to out of that thing," said the first man.

Randolf, the hindquarters, clumsily removed his horse half, but in the process accidentally unzipped his Randolf costume as well, revealing him to be little more than a large cluster of squirrels in a man suit. This surprised Randolf as much as anyone else. "How will I break the news of this to my wife?" the cluster collectively wondered, before dispersing in all directions.

In the near distance Leopold saw what appeared to be the seated corpse of a small boy, obviously dead some time and stiff from rigor mortis. The boy still held a magnifying glass in his rigid hand, which focused on an anthill. Death had visited the boy during one of his daily acts of cruelty.

Leopold approached the boy, his eyes beginning to tear, and stared for a moment. He stared mournfully at the boy then down at the pile of charred ants.

"My son, why did this have to happen to you?" he sobbed. Leopold lifted his leg, angrily knocking the boy's body over with a swift kick executed with the bottom of his right foot.

"You have killed my son with your cruelty!" yelled Leopold to the corpse as he scooped one of the charred ants from the pile. He placed it lovingly into a tissue, and walked away. "We're going home, my son."

A policeman strolling nearby approached after seeing Leopold kick the corpse of the boy.

"I should arrest you. You kicked this lad so hard that he now appears as if dead for days."

"Arrest me? Arrest that corpse; he has killed my son," said Leopold, showing him the tissue.

"Your son? That is an ant!" said the officer, who wore eyeglasses and was very wise.

"Are you deaf? My aunt died long ago. I tell you this is my son!"

"How can that be? It's not human!"

"I know it's not me, sir. For the last time, it's my son! You do not need glasses, you need a hearing aid!"

At that moment, Leopold reached for one of his cement block souvenirs, so as not to forget it, and the officer, sensing a threat, shot him in the head at point blank range.

Nearby, an elderly violinist was preparing a grilled cheese sandwich which would end up, overall, uneaten.

Ray Fracalossy