chapter viii

"Eileen... EILEEN!"  I'm walking, I'm talking, I'm chewing on the side of my cheek in annoyed aggrivation.  Crazy people.  There are some entities in this world which seem to take joy out of making their association a full time job for everyone else. I already had a full time job and this woman will not land as my second job.  Her son, however... different story.

"Eileen, that seems most traumatic for Sharon... Karen, sorry.  Can we PLEASE get back to your son here?  Jeb.  Is it possible for you to please make the trip down here and pick him up at the airport so he can spend some time with you, and the family?"

Her response seems like nothing more than a series of beeps and burps.  I can not take anything this space cadet is signalling - we simply do not speak the same binary.  As Jeb and I walk through the terminal, we pass the aquarium where men and women float about, drifting as if in a daze... a haze, a fog of smog which somehow still appears cleaner than the Atlanta air outside the confines of this grey building of this airport. I shift my backpack at the sight and switch the phone to the other ear.  No one seems happy in their bubble. Everyone should be happy when they're swimming. Atlanta, so fucking backwards, even their water people look like dried bacon.

"Eileen, he could take a car up to you, all expenses are paid for, but it would be nice if you, his father, sis, and the boys could come here and pick him up.  Then you can go out in Atlanta to some place nice. I'm just saying.  How often do you see your son?" I couldn't believe what I was hearing, but with everything so shrouded in secrecy it was no wonder the disbelief of the disengaged were dismissing me in this disenfranchised distortment of avoidance.  Jeb wanted to see his family.  His family had some idea what was going on.  Nobody wanted to say what was happening.  I felt like I was playing Pictionary at the School for the Blind.  "It's a twelve hour layover, Eileen! All he wants to do is see all of you.  It would mean so much to him."

This argument would have been better made if Jeb were not at this very moment walking around to people (children included) in desperation asking with all his heart, "I've lost him... have you seen him?  I really need him.  I NEED to FIND him. I'm looking for Jesus. Have you found him? Because I need him. I need the LOVE of Jesus DEEP inside me..."

I really miss my first job.  Really I do.

The woman on the line was being impossible.  True to form I hung up the phone in frustrated anguish and self inflated arrogance, to a certain extent.  In looking up from my vibrating annoyance, I see Jeb waving from the airport bar, pointing at two shots of Tuaca.  Really?  At this hour?  Whatever hour it was.  It's so pleasent that the rules of alcoholism are tossed aside for air travel.  And really, if you can't find the love of Jesus at the Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport, shots of Tuaca are honestly the next best thing.

"Your mother is being difficult."

"There is little proof Eileen is actually my mother."

"Whoever the woman was who attacked your middle school bully with a tire iron is, THAT person is difficult and..." down the shot, "the only proof I need of possible genealogy is how that specific irksome characteristic seems to have been passed down to the gentleman who stands before me."

"She's not coming, is she?"

"No, Jeb.  Your family as a whole couldn't make the time to come get you."

"That sucks."

"What do you expect?  You have told them nothing of this trip.  You haven't told them why or how... you have kept them at a distance most of your life.  To ask them to drive two hours to pick you up from the airport at the last minute is a little demanding, even for you."

In an overly dramatic sense of blocking, I take my pack and walk off into an empty sitting area nearby.  Jeb follows shortly.  "They should act out of faith, you know.  They should just here the call and just come."

"I think that only works if you give faith out first."

"I know, but still... there is something about heading the call of their son that says 'don't ask questions, just move', you know?"

"Yes... but their son didn't call.  A strange person with cryptic information about their son's demands called.  It's different, and not very understandable.  I agree with you, honestly.  But I don't know what you expected their response to be considering the presentation."

The sudden freeze in banter feels like water in the lungs... dirty raw filth sluged in liquid which had been seeping in slowly throughout this journey and suddenly it ruptured a membrane and attacked our respiratory system with the agility of an oversize gorilla collapsing from a tree.  We want to cry.  Somewhere I'm thinking we need to cry.  But there seems so little point in it, so we just sit, staring.  Shoulder to shoulder we look blankly into knowhere realizing that reality rarely wreaks of such reason, and yet we are silenced in it's decibels.

"I can't leave you here by yourself, Jeb."

"Where is God's given fuck are you going?"

"While in Atlanta, I have some unfinished business to attend to."

"What's his name?"

"I'm hoping I will remember that by the time I get to the bar."

Jeb would sometimes smile proudly at me when statements like that popped from my lips, like Dr. Frankenstein pleased with his creation and how well it was learning.  I don't think I was "learning" as much as letting a lot of stuff out - hidden, deep rooted synapses silenced by Styrofoam covered bibles and prayers made of bubble wrap.  Jeb created nothing, but he seemed to uncover the layers one by one and with each revelation came a new expression of delight and wonder from the stone statue of his public persona... and this reserved giddy would show itself in only one, slightly crooked, ever mischievous half smile.  And right now... I needed to get out of this fucking airport.

Back on the phone I order a car for Jeb and another for myself.  By the time we trekked from Concourse E to the baggage claim, both vehicles where waiting.  I guess it pays to have friends in high places.

Both Lincoln Town Cars were of this year and pearl white.  Maybe if we had friends in high places with better taste, this story would go better.  But I am not one to complain.  Jeb and I look at each other, and without a word we grab our noses and sniff in real deep.  Neither driver seemed to take the joke with any relevance.  We again look at each other like two school children giggling at nothing and approach the cars with humility.

I walk up to the driver taking Jeb to his family.  "You are taking him east to..."

"Instructions and directions have already been forwarded," I was interrupted by the very tall, large semi-truck of a man in a pristine silver pinstripe suite.  I desperately want to ask if he was Optimus Prime.  Jeb shook his head 'no'.  I refrain.

I took a case out of my backpack and handed it to the driver.  "He cannot stay apart from this for too long..."

"Instructions are for you to keep it with you."

"But..."

"Thank you, Sir.  Please proceed to your own vehicle."

I return the case to my backpack and did as instructed.  I look back at Jeb getting into the Town Car and see him in proportion which I do not often get a chance to experience since we are so often in our own world.  In the reality of the physical air molecules around us, Jeb looked weak and small compared to the large leather seats of the COCAINE CHARIOT (as we would later call the vehicles).  His tired body seemed to hold in the bones of a screaming man and the emotions of a monk silenced by a code no one knows but himself.  The door closes to shut him, his thoughts, and his reality away and I am left out by myself... as we all are.  I wished at that moment that Jeb was of this world.  It would make this job so much easier.

I turn to my own ride and gird myself for my own venture.  I was off to see a man about a horse... cock.  Not that he knew what to do with it.  Still... some things need to be done for the properness of humanity and I owned his person a great deal.  Such is my opportunity.  Such I shall do.

The cars pull away and Jeb's vehicle disappears.  I look for my phone to text him but I seem to have misplaced it.

"It is up here, Sir," says my driver.  "No texting while in the vehicle."

Not my money.  Not my rules.  I nod in acceptance and start humming the theme to "Shaft."  My driver is not amused.