The Rose Tattoo (Or, Sketch of One of God's Little Left Overs)

Strictly speaking, Simpson was not a complicated person. He woke up each day ten minutes before his alarm clock sounded. He showered quickly and efficiently and shaved whether he really needed to or not. He liked his coffee black, but not too strong and his white toast lightly buttered with a minuscule dusting of cinnamon and sugar. Simpson left his home every workday at precisely 7:01 a.m. and arrived at Meladon Ficus and Associates, his place of employment for the past 10 years, exactly 45 minutes later. (Sometimes there was an accident or delay on the interstate that caused him to be late by five or ten minutes; but he was so punctual otherwise that everyone assumed he possessed some preternatural sense of traffic patterns and was in his corner cubicle by ten minutes until eight – whether he actually was or not.)

While at work he was focused and professional. His job was not a complicated one and it was not one that provided him with much power, affluence, or notice from his superiors. Fifty or sixty years ago, he would have been called a paper pusher. Now there's very little paper and most of what he does is transfer files from one folder on the server to another folder on the same server so that someone else can look at it after he goes over it. His job is to make sure that the person who saved the document in the file Simpson pulled it from didn't make any mistakes. The person who looked at it after him made sure that Simpson didn't miss anything. Eventually the files made their way to the Executive Board, where they were glanced over as visuals for a presentation that someone else – who had no part in putting the documents together – was giving. And it was that person who would get the credit for the hard work of all the invisible people who touched up document along the way. Simpson didn't mind this; losing out on the credit also meant that he lost out on the blame, too. And this was primarily where he drew satisfaction from his job.

On Wednesdays – which happened to be this particular day – Simpson ate his lunch at half past 12 instead of at noon. No one cared. Not even the the office manager Delores Filtcher. Delores spent most of her days fawning over the young delivery boy who brought FEDEX packages to the 15^thfloor office and talking to the small circle of women she drank with after work. Simpson knew the only reason she sexually harassed the FEDEX delivery man was because she didn't want it to get out that she and her was having an affair with one of the other telephone service specialists, a meek little mouse of a woman named Mildred.

Simpson also thought that maybe Delores was a little scared of him – though he couldn't really understand why.

He sat and ate his lunch – usually a peanut butter and jelly sandwich on white bread (with the crusts cut off, the way his mom used to give them to him when he was bedridden and ill as a child), an apple, and a bottle of lemon flavored iced tea from the vending machine (Simpson didn't like the tarty flavor of real lemon, but he liked the saccharine taste of fake lemon flavoring. ) He said very little to anyone beyond vague pleasantries.

Wednesday was the day he allowed himself to watch Penelope. Penelope had the same job he had, but in another department. On Wednesdays she always wore her back in a pony tail. And while Penelope was a beautiful woman every other day of the week, long auburn hair, hazel eyes, and a well cared for physique. Simpson imaged by the sculpted curvature of her rear and the flatness of her stomach that she worked out at least two to three times a week. (Simpson himself did not.) And while that was an especially pleasant bonus, it wasn't those things about her that attracted his attention.

It was the tattoo.

A small rose tattoo, to be exact, just below her hair line on the back of her neck. It was small, ornate. Against her pale winter skin it looked like etching on fine porcelain. There was no indication that there were tattoos anywhere else on her body; Simpson had seen her in a variety of sleeveless, short, and long-sleeved professional outfits and there was nothing on her arms. She sometimes wore a skirt when the weather was warm and there was no ink marring her perfectly shaped legs. He supposed she could have tattoos other places; but he didn't like to think of her abdomen being marred with ink... or anywhere else, either.

No, it was just a small, single tattoo. He liked to sit and imagine the story of it as he ate his peanut butter and jelly sandwich with the crusts cut off. He liked to imagine it was some brief bout of college indiscretion; in his more imaginative moments, he imagined that it wasn't a tattoo at all, but a rare birthmark. Something that made her precious. Rare. Distinct. But maybe she was unaware of what it really meant, and maybe she had always wanted to know... that thing that only he could tell her because it was knowledge that he was born with, something he had known his entire, dull existence, without even knowing WHY he knew it. But it had been there. Waiting. Waiting for the moment when the two of them would occupy the same space at the same time. Waiting so that he could tell her his secret knowledge... and in the knowing, together they would both be free.

He timed eating his sandwich to coincide with her finishing her egg salad croissant and stood so that he would reach the door before she did. He did this every Wednesday, so it required almost no thought. When they met together at the door, each and every Wednesday, Simpson thought that might be the moment he could tell her the meaning of the rose tattoo and free them both. He imagined the moment over and over again: the expression on her face as he mouthed the words that she had been needing to hear her entire life – words that she was unaware of, except for the great emptiness of their absence. He imagined her smiling, maybe touching the rose lightly, and a slight tear rolling down her otherwise perfect face. “Thank you,” she would say. “I always hoped it would be you.”

As he approached her, reaching for the door in order to open it, he prepared. The words, he knew were on his lips. He had only to speak. Then he opened the door, and she looked up at him and smiled a glorious smile.

Then her cell phone rang.

“Oh!” she said, hurrying through the open door and answering her phone. “Thanks, Simmons,” she hissed quickly over her shoulder.

Simpson stood there for a moment, then walked through himself. He didn't follow her down the hall. Instead he went back to his office and went about the rest of his day, wondering whether Penelope was aware of the company policy regarding cell phone usage during work hours.

Sketch of One of Life's Great Middle Managers

When his alarm clock sounded promptly at six in the morning on this particular Thursday morning – like it did every Monday through Friday morning at six – Lawrence Fitzpickle met the day with the usual resignation that gave him no options and nothing to think about. Delores, his wife of more than 25 years, lay on her side, snoring and drooling onto the pillow. She didn't have to wake up as early and as a rule, she didn't because she worked 2^ndshift at the Juvenile Women's Correctional Facility located one town over. Lawrence sat up gingerly and slid off the bed; he was sore... more sore than usual. The only reason he budged at all was because the alarm was blaring and because after spending several hours being the bottom in Delores' Wednesday Night Strap-On Fantasy, his bowels were about to release a movement of semi-biblical proportions.

After he was finished on the toilet, and after making sure there were no more open wounds, Lawrence the hall towards the kitchen. He walked into the kitchen and was greeted by Tumbles the cat ,sitting on the kitchen counter in front of the coffee pot, staring at him. Waiting. There had been a time when Lawrence tried to make his coffee before letting the cat out; but over the years the two of them had developed a sort of détente. Lawrence had agreed to let the cat out first and the cat agreed – in as much as cats can agree to anything – not to piss on his pillow.

Lawrence considered this one of his more successful negotiations, and tried to apply its lessons to other parts of his life. He especially liked that it required no words, no confrontation, no listing of demands.

Tumbles the cat, seeing that Lawrence was indeed going to continue to abide by their silent agreement, he jumped off the counter and flounced towards the back door. Lawrence followed him, unlocked the door, opened it, and stood there as the cat stepped grandly out into the day.

Closing the door behind Tumbles, Lawrence set about making coffee. When he looked in the cabinet, he noticed they were out of the coffee he liked; he'd forgotten to buy some on the way home the day before. The only coffee there was the hazelnut flavored kind Delores liked sometimes. He didn't like hazelnut coffee; it left an after taste in his mouth that he found unpleasant and reminded him of dirty socks. He put enough water and grounds in the coffee maker to brew a full pot even though he knew Delores would only drink half of one cup.

While he was in the shower, Lawrence thought about his day. Today would be like yesterday and like tomorrow. Even though the weekend was approaching, there was nothing exciting to look forward to, except for the extra two hours of sleep he would get. As the water trickled down from his balding scalp down his puffy frame, Lawrence looked down at himself and wondered what his life might have been like if he had been bolder. It wasn't that he didn't love his wife; it wasn't even that he hated his job, particularly. His job was a job like most others and he was sure Delores was a wife like most others. He felt like the people under him in his department liked him. He felt like the executive managers liked him. He hadn't been offered a promotion ever since he'd been the youngest employee to be made Department Manager. The trajectory had been clear, then; he had been sure he was the fast track. But the next bump never came; after a while, when his bosses were younger men than he was, Lawrence stopped hoping for that next promotion.

The only thing that was going to make his day bearable was the cup of coffee he planned to stop and get on the way to work. He'd have to stop at the coffee shop and stand in line; but it was Thursday, which meant that pretty young girl... the one who always smiled and who always remembered what kind of coffee he wanted … would be working. Lora. Her name was Lora. Lora with the long red hair, shiny eyes, and puffy lips. Lora who was working her way through college to be an elementary school teacher. Lora with the nose ring and tiny star tattoo on her neck. He often wondered if she had other tattoos and where they were. It would be improper to ask, of course. But he liked to imagine them, highlights on her young body, stories of a life still fresh with possibilities. He thought about her and he felt himself come alive. Just a little. But then Lawrence's excitement turned to sadness, then resignation when he realized he'd gotten too much soap in an open cut left behind by Delores' new strap-on monster, the Majestic 7000.

Sketch of An Important Man

 The only thing Dolf Packer despised more than news reporters was when some stupid son of a bitch parked in his parking space in front of the County Courthouse. And when it was a god damned reporter parked in his space – that was both despicable and unforgivable.

           

He was already in a bad mood when he pulled his truck onto Main Street.  His business wasn’t at the courthouse, but at Town Hall across the street. Dolf Packer was going to have a sit down with the mayor and tell him what’s what. He knew that dwarf motherfucker, Leslie Banes, would be there. It was Thursday, and that was the day he came into the office.  Thursday was also the day that Sarah, the college intern, was working. Sarah did the filing and the typing. She was learning about government and administration because that was what she wanted to do. Dolf Packer didn’t like her; well, that wasn’t quite right.  A more precise way of describing his feelings is this: whenever Dolf fucked his wife Janine, he imaged he was fucking Sarah. Sarah was young and had a young woman’s body. Janine’s body had been destroyed over the years from carrying Dolf’s four sons and from taking care of them and Dolf. Janine was old; but she knew her place. Sarah was young, and like all these young girls going to college, they thought they deserved more. Dolf knew she needed a real man – not one of these college boy pussies – to point her in the right direction. But that wasn’t his job. Banes only came into the office on Thursdays because he was chasing after Sarah the way he chased after every young woman in town. Dolf figured that she was too smart to give herself over to a midget; but then again, he reasoned, she was just a dumb pretty twat with delusions of being a city manager.

           

He knew Banes would see him. He damn well better, he told himself.  Banes needed Dolf Packer’s support to stay in office. He needed Packer’s money. He needed Packer’s influence. He needed Packer’s backing, because nothing got done in Arliss County unless Dolf Packer wanted it to get done. And the purpose of his visit to Leslie Banes was to make sure something DIDN’T happen. 

           

What Dolf Packer didn’t want to happen was for an ordinance to pass at the next Town Council meeting. Most ordinances aren’t that big of a deal, and since Packer didn’t live in town, most of them never impacted him.  However, this ordinance would. There were a lot of old buildings in town, and there had been a push to either fix them or tear them down. The historical society wanted to save them, because they were all college educated pussies or bored housewives. They squawked in the paper about remembering the past and how this or that building was an important piece of architecture. Sentimental bullshit.  The common sense approach, Dolf knew, was to simply tear them down. That would be cheaper. That was also the way of the world. Old things crumbled and new things were built right on top of them.

           

And that was exactly what he intended to do. He’d bought old man Thompson’s old garage at the base of Main Street because he intended to demolish it and put up a new building… then he’s sell the new building, or lease it if there weren’t any immediate takers. Packer paid old man Thompson’s son pennies on the dollar of what it was worth, and he intended to triple (at least) his money.

           

But then Paterson and those Historical Society pussies decided it was “architecturally significant,” and started petitioning Banes and the town council to pass an ordinance that would limit what he, Packer could do. With his OWN property. Besides the fact that it was un goddamned American, he told himself and everyone else who would listen, it was also just goddamned inconvenient. And by the time he paid for all the changes the new ordinance would require—preserving the “architectural integrity” and “historical accuracy” of the crumbling pile of bricks – he’d be stuck with a white whale of a building that he could never unload, except at a loss. And Dolf Packer didn’t take a loss on anything. Not ever.

           

The mayor could care less, but Packer had it on good authority that he had managed to tap Paterson’s college age daughter when she visited over Christmas. The twat was clearly a whore… and a freaky one at that, Packer figured, since she spread her legs for that dwarf… but Packer figured maybe she threatened to yell rape if he didn’t support her daddy’s idea.  That was the only reason Banes would even let the thing get as far as it has. Banes was too much of a pig fucker to fall in love with a piece of ass, and he could give a shit less about historical preservation. So Dolf planned on reasoning with him. And if that didn’t work, he’d tell the midget son of a bitch that maybe it was time for a new mayor come November. “The world’s full of dip shit midget who want to be mayor,” he’d planned on saying.  He even practiced it in the mirror while he was shaving that morning, he liked the sound of it so much.

           

 And then… that fucker was parked in his spot.

           

Packer knew him. His name was Rafferty. He had come from some other  place, started writing for one of the papers, and started making trouble. He’d been the one who wrote the article that got ol’ Paterson tied up in knots, which led to the ordinance that was going to be voted on at the next council meeting. Packer had it on good authority that the ordinance would pass, whether he showed up at the meeting or not.  He wasn’t sure where all this backbone on the town council was coming from; he’d helped all of the council members but one get elected. But he knew that somehow, Paterson had leverage and that goddamned outsider Rafferty stirred up the pot.

           

The spot next to his spot was empty; and actually, that spot was closer to both the steps leading to the courthouse doors and to the town hall.  But that wasn’t the point. Instead of parking in the empty spot, Packer parked right behind Rafferty’s car – blocking him and the street.  Rafferty was leaning against his piece of shit primer orange ’84 Subaru sedan, smoking and staring off into the sky. When Packer put his truck in park and got out, Rafferty looked over at him, smiled, and waved.

           

I’m going to get that little son of a bitch, Packer thought. He’s made my life difficult one too many times.

           

Affable: Draft 1 (Click on the pages to make them bigger)

Sketch of The Reason Why (Zed's Justification)

Everything about her seemed deliberate. No. Deliberate’s the wrong word. Practiced. Everything about seemed practiced. Yes. Practiced. Not like she stood in front of the bathroom mirror every morning going over her accent, elocution, smile, wink, and blink that made her come off more like a Victorian Era coquette than a Gen-X burnout. She was practiced in the way a woman becomes practiced because she always did the same things. A lovely creature of habit that, if she had bothered knowing anyone long enough, her mimicry of herself would have been found out.

But Alice didn’t get to know people. Or maybe it was that she didn’t get close to them. Not really. Alice was warm and friendly, flirty, fun, a good conversationalist. Good drinking partner. The kind of person that people instantly fell in love with, wanted to be around, wanted to talk to, wanted to impress. And yet, she never told anybody anything about her. That was her. She wasn’t a woman you wanted to know as much as she was a mystery you needed to solve.

We had mutual friends because she had an affair with my best friend Donnie. Calling it an affair makes it sound seedier than it was, though, because he wasn’t married. But they were together for almost an entire month; they were always together. In that whole time, he never knew anything about her except the exact number of tattoos on her body and how she liked her coffee. She liked her coffee with amaretto and whole milk. Donnie wouldn’t talk to me about the tattoos.

Then I ran into him one time and she wasn’t there. I asked him where she was.

He shrugged. “I dunno.”

“She didn’t stay over last night?”

He shook his head. “Nope.”

“You guys have an argument?”

“Nope.” Donnie seemed satisfied and not all that heart broken. Women usually liked Donnie. Donnie was exciting. Dangerous. Or, at least he played the part. So I assumed I’d see Alice again eventually. I thought about her from time to time and sometimes I’d ask Donnie if he’d heard from her. He hadn’t. Sometimes I would call her. She never picked up or returned any of my calls.

When I saw her again, it was two years later. I was standing in line at a coffee shop in Seattle. I was there on business. She was standing right in front of me. Her hair was a different color; but I knew it was her. I said her name, and she turned around. It took her a minute; then she smiled and asked how I’d been. She talked to me like she couldn’t remember my name.

“Zed,” I reminded her. “I’m doing fine,” I said. “I’m here on business.”

“Hmm,” she answered. “That’s nice.” I expected her to ask me what kind of business I was in. She didn’t. She also didn’t say why she was there or how long she had been living in Seattle.

“Do you ever talk to Donnie?” I asked

“Hmm?” Alice looked up from ordering her coffee. She ordered espresso with whole milk and amaretto syrup. She looked like she was trying to remember who I was talking about. “Oh. No.”

“Oh. Well, he’s married now.”

“Good for him.” She smiled. I didn’t detect a hint of sadness. I didn’t detect a hint of anything.

“I’m still not married.” I regretted it the instant the words came out of my mouth. I knew how it sounded. Desperate.

“Oh. That’s nice.” She paid for her coffee and moved on. She waved at me and smiled. I thought about asking her if she wanted to meet for drinks; but she was out the door before I could.