The Son of Every Man

Chapter 3.1

Gabe still has the note his mother left him before ending her life. Its body reads, "As you know, my childhood was filled with sad things, but because of your father, and because of you, I was able to be happy for many years. Thank you for bringing me joy. Please don't worry about me, or be sad that I am gone. Find my diaries in the black dresser and keep them with you. Sell everything else at your discretion to ease financial burden. As you read this, know that I am with your father again. I am confident you have everything you need to be happy in this world. Your time among the living will be long, and it will be joyful."

"Gabe," I repeat. He stares out the front window. It is a sunny day, clear and hot. The lawn surrenders its overnight moisture in steaming waves.

He looks at me suddenly. "What?"

"Do you want to take a break?"

"No," he says. "Sorry. What did you ask me before?"

"I asked if you still believe in the Willow Man."

Gabe breathes out in one steady rush of air and folds his hands in his lap. "No." He is thoughtful for a moment, then laughs in an odd way. "No, the Willow Man has gone away forever."

"What was that thing your neighbor used to say to you? The little verse?"

More quiet laughter as pen moves across paper. "I chose to walk toward him. They tried to flee. He took all the others, but he didn't take me."

;-;

Three nights in a row, Gabe helped himself to friendly conversation with Miguel. He wrestled with this indulgence, believing it to be both risky and necessary for the sake of his sanity. He wasn't sure what to think of his strange new acquaintance. But the young man had so far been superficially kind to him, and didn't act like he had anything to prove, to anyone—a trait that, by itself, Gabe liked very much.

As Gabe rode the Orange Line back into the city, the thought bolted through his mind that Miguel might even be like him. Of course, this was only wishful thinking—and what exactly was he wishing for? What about the possibility did he find so magnetic?

Gabe disliked these distant reaches of the city, so sprawling and wide open, preferring the boundaries (physical and otherwise) imposed by the cozy streets he called home. To his right, ornate but chintzy fencing separated rail from roadway. Across four vast empty lanes lay a sidewalk the color of unstained teeth, followed by a wasteland of painted asphalt. At last, glowing big box stores ballooned laterally in the hazy distance like a whole shelf's worth of books flaunting their front covers instead of their spines. To Gabe's eye, there was something shameless about it. Something arrogant. Along this section, the train operated as nothing more than a streetcar, exposed to the pitch-black morning, halting at traffic signals, yielding to phantom cars, and finally ducking underground at Biscayne, where it would accelerate through miles of cut-and-cover tunnel as if set free.

Before long, the walls of the tunnel closed in, and he found comfort near them. He was exhausted, nodding off a few times during the half-hour journey underground. Each time he opened his eyes, a few more people filled seats; by the time the train came to a lurching halt along the terminus platform, only a handful of open spaces remained. He was fully alert now, alive with the promise of some as-yet-unknown encounter. In one jerky, pre-programmed movement, he set off on his diversion, bumping past early-risers and night-owls until he landed himself at the top of the corridor.

Someone had fixed the lights. Not all of them were replaced, but it seemed a modest surplus of tubes had finally found their way into dusty sockets. The passage suffered under such honest light. Stained porcelain wall tiles grew a more putrid yellow and pieces of waste materialized all around him. A women's magazine lay open near his feet, ink bleeding across its damp pages.