He thought she was cute. And his mom liked her... so? Why not ask her out?

She thought he was cute, so she asked around for his name. Then she used Linked-In to find out where he worked. Then she tricked the receptionist out of his address. She followed him from that address to the gym, which she immediately joined and eaves-dropped from the machine across from his until she got his sister’s name, whom she sought out and befriended. From the sister she got their mother’s workplace, where she made an appointment to get her hair done.

Because if his mom likes her, then she must be all right!

Right?

Right???

Any fool can burn it down. All it needs is a match.

But it takes a man to look at nothing, imagine something, and to create that something from the nothing at hand.

When that fool who would burn it down could not even make the match.

Everyone in town agreed the lake was haunted, but only I knew what was actually buried beneath it, and no one was asking me for answers. Those lucky enough to have survived it really didn’t even care to know what was there, though they did enjoy a knew-found appreciation of life.

It‘s hard to imagine that it has been a mere twenty-seven years since it all began, but back in 1998 my best friend Theresa Dunkmeier and I were in a race to turn eighteen years old, so that we would be adult enough to get out of this place; Theresa wanting out because she was bound for bigger things, and I wanting out because I was different.

Donaville, the place where Theresa and I had lived our whole lives, was just one more in the long line of bass-akwards Appalachian mountain town’s which struggled to survive along Highway 17, towns all alike but in name; Pottsville, Adley, Summit, Crestview and Donaville. And like the others Donaville was small, tight, and under-educated, but Godly. Donaville, like most small towns, was a place of strong and conservative opinion. And back in the 1990’s there had been many of those women in Donaville who wore their knickers in a self-righteous wad, preachy women who loved none but their God, proving their love for him by posting prayers signs out in their front yards so that passers-by could see it, and on the bumpers of their twelve year old Chevy Citations. Donaville was home to the type of women who looked to God for perfection whilst finding fault with every other human alive. Yes, the Sunday morning gatherings in Donaville were full of that type of woman, but there was also another type of woman, a minority type of the exact opposite persuasion…a type consisting solely of one Theresa Dunkmeier, a pretty young girl who was looking for something out there besides that, and of yours truly, Theresa’s best friend and willing sidekick.

My name is Wilhelmina Gipe, though I go by “Lovey”, which is the name my daddy always called me by, and the one that thankfully stuck rather than my grandma’s honorary Wilhelmina. And I am not queer, though for the purposes of this story I must admit to an almost unhealthy adolescent attraction that I carried for my friend Theresa that was not dissimilar to a first crush. That is to say that I very nearly idolized her, and therefore longed for her when she was not there, and longed to touch her when she was, and did so at every opportunity, whether brushing out her hair, or painting her toe nails, or my favorite; cuddling for warmth under a blanket on the couch during late night television binges where our bodies pressed together as one, and where I would be permitted to nuzzle up to her neck, and to stroke the softness along her inner arm for extended periods, an act so intoxicating that I would have happily continued it forever, and after which I could not have told you which shows we had just watched when the privilege was finally removed, so filled was my head with desire to appease her.

The Main Street Meat-and-Three where Theresa and I worked was the only thing boring about Theresa, who was easily the prettiest girl in the Donaville High School we both attended, and she was probably the smartest too, though she was neither a cheerleader nor an honors student. Theresa was not a “club” kind of girl. She was unique in style and temperament. Theresa Dunkmeier was not born for the likes of Donaville, and it was obvious to everyone that she would not long remain there, myself included, which probably had something to do with my clingy-ness to her.

But this particular day was not boring. On this particular day a man walked into our cafe, and I don’t mean a high school type boy-man either, but a real, living, breathing, confidence-oozing, “knows-what-he-wants-and-how-to-get-it-man”. I easily recognized the signs of Theresa’s attraction to him as being the self-same magnetism which drew me so to her, and so it was obvious to me, and probably to him, that he would indeed get what he wanted from her, whatever that was. And what he wanted from her, happily for me, was a party. Happily for me that is because I would have gladly let this man (or any other) do what he would with me so long as she would be naked beside me too, and so long as my hands could slide over the contours and crevices of her while he did what he must behind me, and God knew what other titillating wonders he might have me do to her, or her to me? The blood in my veins pulsed through the outer skin at the very thought of it.

We quit our jobs that day, Theresa and I, walking out straightaway amidst fits and giggles. And we climbed together into the cab of Wesley’s Peterbilt 18 wheeler where the two of us held hands as the spewing of air brakes sent us sailing towards the parking spot high above Lake Thibodeaux, which was the nearest place to heaven that we knew.

It took nothing once there. The truck driver Wesley sat back in his seat once the big rig shuddered to a stop, whence he popped the shifter into neutral and engaged the parking brake. “Y’all go ahead and get things started,” he said, feigning nonchalance as he reached for the tuning knob, stopping it at the local rock station where Bob Segar howled out our teenaged angst. Theresa leaned towards me then, a soft smile on lips which lingered, hovering so close to mine that I actually, physically ached for them before they finally pressed so delicately wet against mine, sending waves of shock and pleasure through all points of me. And when I kissed her back (and oh! How I kissed her back), desperate to make her realize that it was me she wanted, and not this Wesley guy! And in that vein oh, how I straddled myself across her lap! And oh, how my hands ripped at her buttons and at her belt! And oh, how my legs bumped against different hard things as I ground myself into her, and oh! How did no one in this erotic moment notice that the gigantic rig had begun to roll?

Being on top, just in the nick of time was I able to jump, hitting on the steep slope feet first where momentum tossed me ass-over-teakettle downwards in great bounds, but still, I was the lucky one. And when I finally came to a rest, uncaring of myself or my injuries, I lifted my battered head and stared wide-eyed down the long hillside to where the tractor holding my friend had already disappeared in deep, black water, and was pulling the trailer down behind it, just a large white box with wheels, a single word in blue paint scripted upon it’s side… Pfizer.

It’s lonely now in Donaville, but I have the memory of Theresa to hold me, of the taste of her lips, and of her wriggling beneath me as the truck and I both went down on her.

But years have dulled the pain, the years and the lake water. It is addicting now, that lake water. And that is why there are no men left in Donaville… this addiction. Only women can survive it, and they will, but barely. These desperate, horny, Appalachian women who have discovered the effects of Lake Thibodeaux and shared it‘s benefits with their friends, and sisters, and cousins, though they cannot know its cause. But lure a man in, they have found, and the woman who does so will be treated to the greatest eight hours imaginable… eight, solid, size increasing, endurance enhancing, butt-cheek clinching hours of unbearable pleasure enough to kill any man, and any woman… nearly.

But she will survive it, and she will want it again. And so she will wait, zombie-like, with her skirt raised along the highway as bait for any truck driver, traveling salesman, or high school football team bus which drifts innocently into town. And woe be to the ones who stop for a dip… though some deaths are to be desired more-so than others.

My lot is to live and breathe, learn and labor, laugh and die in this world. Therefore, this is not only the best of possible worlds, it is the only possible world; handed down through ages as is, leaving one born of it little choice but to navigate within its furrows through life’s quest for purpose.

Being wealthy gave Voltaire the leisure to ponder philosophically. I, on the other hand, must work in my world to eat. Guess that makes me a Leibniz guy; making the most of what is.

When the woman wants bread, the child needs milk, and invaders rap at the door?

Those worries shape this man’s world… and philosophizing (while quaint) will not stop the rain.

Is a good thing this prompt has an extended end date, as I had forgotten to respond. Please forgive me for it, as I am no longer young, and I forget tons of important stuff anymore. I forget birthdays, anniversaries, breakfast, and where the hell my keys are for instance, when they are in my very hand.

Just as I have forgotten what it is like to have twenty challenges at once to engage with, like “Promptomania 2018”, where lived Challenges of the Week, and Challenges of the Month, and challenges under each portal, and philosophy challenges, comedy challenges, and pet challenges, musical prompts and political vile spewed and religion too, almost like the conversations around the table at Thanksgiving dinner… what fun! (Ok, so I made up the Promptomania thing, big deal. But it felt like that back then, and I thought that sounded cool in the literary moment, though in retrospect...)

And I have forgotten what it is like to know how many “likes” a post got, or how long ago it was originally posted.

And I have forgotten what it feels like to wake up early, to open my tablet excited to write, and to read other’s writes, and to like and to comment in kind. So, if you have bothered to read this, have pity on a forgetful old guy and do what an old Prose friend taught a long time ago:

For every post you make, read 10 others, and like them, or comment on why not. Get involved in the site and it will reciprocate.

And create a challenge. Nay, create a challenge a week, or two even. And read the entries in your challenge. All of them. You’ll be surprised at how good the writers you don’t regularly read write.

Just think, your very presence could be the good deed that breathes some life back into this old Proser. You could be my Prose hero!

So get yourself involved. Be a Prose activist! If for no other reason, do it for Ol Huck’s mental health. (Though you might find that it’s good for your own.)

PS- I appreciate you all. Sorry I haven’t been as active lately. I will work on that.

Oops! And I almost forgot! Thanks for the inspiring challenge, @beatricegomes!

(Would he be a bearer of bad news, or a marsupial of bad news?)

So see, he must be a bear!

I did not think that a bear can whisper, especially not in English, so I am prone to believe it… that a Koala is not a bear, that is?

Of course these days, no matter what it is, it only needs to say it is not a bear, re-pronoun itself, and then it can be whatever it wants… even if what it wants is to be a female swimmer (or so says Simone).

I recall hearing a few years ago that the Giant Panda was finally reclassified as a bear. Up until 1980 or so it had been classified as a raccoon, so it could be that the Koala is right after all, and is not a bear, but is actually a possum? But more so I find it intriguing that it even cares if it’s a bear? I mean what else would it want to be? Certainly it does not want to be a man! Ugh. Or even a woman... not even if it can outswim one.

I heard where something like 80% of women surveyed said that if they were alone in the woods they would feel safer coming across a bear than a man. Those women must think the bear they came across would be a Koala, mustn't they? I mean, the average man would certainly be better to come across than would a Polar, or a Grizzly Bear? Good grief, the average man in the wild would not even notice she was there anyways, and would continue playing his video game right up until supper time. And if she didn’t feel like cooking (which she likely would not these days) he would be ok with Door-Dash, while a proper bear who was not a Koala would probably be less willing to wait on it’s supper, if you know what I mean? Just my thoughts on the matter.

Perhaps the Koala doesn’t want to be a bear because it is embarrased by the, “does a bear shit in the woods” question? I know I am, every time some beary dumb person repeats it.

Say, which bear is it that hibernates while standing on its head? Oh yea, Yoga Bear!

I know, I know. Sorry about that one.

Y’all do like a Polar Bear and stay cool, you hear!

There’s a back room rack

in this shotgun shack

where experience lies in wait

To be brung to the fore

come a knock on the door

from pressures of worldly conflate

And in hallway frames

expectations hang

which talents have yet to create

Frames devoid of degree

yet which aptly decree

to fools who would pontificate

Then there’s hope and ambition

on the stove in the kitchen

with confidence cooling on plates

And wisdoms gleaned fleeting

on breezes whilst reading

from a porch-swing just inside the gate

Now, granted a mansion

with arches and transom's

might seem a more pert starting place

But fascia’s may hide

many problems that lie

under legacies laid intestate

So, if this space seems rough

then you mustn’t know much

’bout how foundations solidify traits

’Cause it’s been pre-ordained

that come bluster or blame

this here structure will handle the weight

Ah, I get it. You’re looking for a Rocky story, huh? A humble cornerstone who weathers adversity, sticking like glue to it’s chiseled foundations?

P-Shaw, says I. Doesn’t happen. He with the most mortar will not win in the end, not anymore than the sandstone that was deemed too soft and so was chucked atop the undesirables’ cairn. That one can hold up another is illusory. After all, that wedged-in smaller chunk was part and parcel of the larger once, was it not? Back before selfishly breaking away? And is it really any stronger having gone? Nah. Is just one more gravel in the bag.

All the stones, big and small, wind up dust on the scattered ground, by-the lonely-bye. So don’t put too much weight on the little guy... he’s having a tough enough time just keeping his own chips together.

Lonnie Levis awoke from a most horrible dream to an even worse reality; being naked in a strange bed in a strange room, his hands and fingers dug with an intense cruelty into the neck of some unfamiliar and equally naked woman whom he had incredulously discovered lying beneath him. That the two of them had done “it” was obvious, though he remembered nothing of it, and he wanted no part in it. He had obviously blacked out, but why? How? None of this was like him! He was married after all, if only somewhat happily. And there were kids to consider...

Still, here he was, his eyes locked onto those of a dying woman, their examination of his so desperate for relief that it frightened him to see it. Could she not see that he was no killer? Yet here he was. And there was such comprehension in her eyes… such awareness that she was nearly gone, leading Lonnie’s addled consciousness to the same conclusion. Yet something was off here. Something was wrong, something that made Lonnie cling to his grip, something as yet unseen in the dingy, filtered light emitted through the nicotine-stained shade atop the headboard wall lamp, a light which illuminated her mottled face even as her legs and abdomen spasmed beneath him in their last feeble attempts at air. Lonnie’s own eyes watched the light fading in hers and alerted the fact of it to his brain which screamed for him to let her go, but his hands would not. They could not.

“What was it?” He wondered, almost calmly. “What was the thing that felt amiss here?“ And so despite Lonnie’s full-on gasp of the direness of the situation… even still, he did not let her go.

He wanted to let go. Honest he did. But how? Who was this woman? Why was she here? Why was he here, for that matter, and what had led them to this? His thoughts were so scrambled the he could not remember, and so he held tight to the one thing that felt concrete, even though it was not. She would go to the police if he let go. She would surely tell them what he was currently engaged in doing to her, wouldn’t she? Of course she would! He would not even blame her for that. He would expect his wife, or his daughter, to do as much if they found themselves in such a situation. And the police would believe her, too! The woman is always believed, isn’t she? He would end up in jail! He would become just another negative racial crime statistic despite a lifetime committed to family, God, and purpose; not necessarily in that order.

But then as the light in her eyes faded scenes began flashing through Lonnie’s mind; dream-like memories of warming the barstool which served him as an escape from the coldness awaiting at home, memories of drinks consumed to wash away that home’s troubles, and the memory of a woman in a slinky, black dress seating herself on a vacant stool beside him… this very woman whose life he now held in his hands. And throughout this flash of remembrance the pleasant way this woman had smiled at him stood out keenly, and how that smile had made him feel; manly and desirable, when just moments before his whole existence had felt completely unraveled.

He had been played. He was sure of it… but how?

Lonnie had never been with a white woman. It was his brag that he liked his women as “black as his coffee,” and he appreciated a black woman’s aura of strength. Yet he’d also always harbored an unspoken, back-of-mind curiosity, a fantasy if you will… a fantasy that would never be realized, of course. How would it be with a white woman, he wondered? What would her kiss be like? How would she feel beneath him? On top of him? How would he feel inside her? Different? And if different, how so?

Fantasy and situation in mind, it would have been easy, wouldn’t it? When the timing is right, and the opportunity? A returned smile, some light conversation, a bought drink, that unmistakeable signal of a foot “accidently“ pressed to your leg. Even he could see how it might have happened… but had it?

Lonnie Levis was a proud man, and so it pained him that he had somehow lost his wife’s respect. He was a smart man, too. Smart enough to know that that’s what all this came down to. Dominique would never talk to him the way she currently did if she still respected him, not if she respected him the way she had in their early days. Lonnie was not even exactly sure of when the change had taken place, but over time there had been a slow transformation in the way she greeted him when he came through the door, beginning with an indifference which had, over time, morphed itself into a displeasure which gradually worsened to actual disgust until Lonnie was now at his breaking point.

That’s just it, too. A mere woman had broken him, hadn’t she?

A good man, Lonnie had tried and tried again, attempting to combat her manipulations with alternating indignation and docility, but nothing he attempted satisfied her. One resolved issue only revealed another. He wanted his marriage to work, so he tried. God, how he tried! He loved the life he and Dominique had built. He loved his children, but what does a man do when his best is no longer good enough? Lonnie was at the point now where he knew before he arrived what awaited him at home; a wife’s anger fueled by a combination of Chardonay and phone conversations convened with a divorced best friend named Natasha who sported a big ass and a bigger mouth, both of which spelled out to Lonnie the smallness of her brain. With his peace gone, life had gotten to the point where Lonnie did not even want to return after a long day at work to the home he so loved… and so tonight he hadn’t.

But damned if he didn’t wish himself there now.

But giving Dominique her due, Lonnie knew he was not the perfect man. He had put on a few pounds since college, and he was usually exhausted after long shifts walking the floor of the distribution center where it was his job to keep things moving at an inhumanely required pace. But he did it, didn’t he? And he never complained about it. And he’d gotten Dominique away from the East Side hadn’t he, just like she’d wanted? And she was driving the car she wanted, and watching the big screen television she’d wanted while lounging on the sofa she’d demanded… but it wasn’t enough, was it? It never was. What more can a man do? And after working hard to get her all of those things, she now complained that he was never home.

No shit.

So he’d determined that tonight he would show her, hadn’t he? Tonight he wouldn’t go home! Tonight he’d get a room at the Marriott and turn off his cell phone. Tonight she‘d get a taste of what it was like to be alone. Tonight she would see! He’d show her!

But he hadn’t counted on this, had he? This white woman? He had taken no account of pouty lips, innocent eyes, or a softly rounded figure... just the type he was attracted to.

He hadn’t taken them into account then, but he sure was now. Dear Lord, was he!

And it was at that very moment when he saw it, out of the corner of his eye... an i-phone leaned a little too purposefully against the blinking clock radio on the bed stand.

That was it! That was the thing… the subconscious reason he couldn’t let the woman go! In his excitement at the discovery Lonnie released his death grip on her throat to reach for the phone. When he did the body that had stilled beneath him jumped as if pricked, jack-knifing around his own body which sat astride of her. And as it jumped, it sucked in a voluminous amount of air, choking and spitting as it did so. Unmoved by her thrashings Lonnie leaned over next in the other direction, reaching for the eyeglasses placed on the other bedside without actually offering the woman beneath him any additional freedom. Calmly placing the glasses on, he took his time, studying the phone curiously this way and that. Touching the screen, it immediately lit up, revealing what he suspected. She had been video-taping the whole thing!

”What is this?” He asked. “Who are you? What are you doing?”

”Give me the phone and I’ll explain.”

”No. Just tell me.”

”I can’t. I have to show you.”

Still astride of her and seemingly in control of the situation, Lonnie could see no harm in it. “All right, but this ain’t over yet. Don’t you mess with me, you hear?” He handed her the phone. “Now, tell me who you are?”

She took some deep breaths, surprising him with how fast her looks returned to normal with just a few breaths of life. “My name is Bethany Childress.” She said, the words coming out in great gasps. “Dwayne Henderson sent me.”

”Dwayne Henderson? That TV lawyer?” Lonnie showed his confusion.

”Yep.” Hitting play, Bethany Childress showed Lonnie the video, all of it; the barstool flirting, the two of them laughing their way up to his room, the sex… that part embarrassing him with how rough it became, and by how she so obviously coaxed him into pushing things further and further with her sounds, and her movements, and no small amount of her own devilments. And crazily, watching himself on the screen was like watching a stranger perform for her, as Lonnie could remember none of it.

But how would he understand? How could he? Slipping the pill into his drink had been the one thing she’d left off of the video. And then, as he watched in amazement, her finger reached up and tapped the “send” button, emitting an ominous chill up his spine.

”There.” She actually smiled at him. “Dwayne Henderson has it all now.” She tried pushing him away, and began to wiggle from under him when that didn’t work. “So then,“ she continued, “thank God that is over! You can get off of me now, you fuckhead!”

“But what would Dwayne Henderson want that tape for? The man doesn’t even know me?”

She stopped herself mid-wiggle. “You really are a dumbass, aren’t you? No wonder your wife wants out. She hired him, of course.”

”Hired him? For what?” But she didn’t have to answer. The woman he’d committed his life to: the one who had cut off having sex with him seven years ago, who’d begun berating him five years ago, who hired in the cleaning and ordered in the cooking the last three years, had found her way to take it all from him… house, kids, and car.

It crossed his mind to grab hold again; to choke the arrogant conceit out of this nostril pierced 304, and then to go find Dominique and give her some of the same.

But he would not. He could not.

He could not, because Lonnie Levis, for better or worse, was fated to be the good man.