vignette ~ Harry's Dead

Clang. Clang. Clangittyclangitty. Clang. The wind kept knocking something metal against the library’s flag pole. It’d gotten a lot colder this evening. More wind plus cold equals hell-of-a-lot colder, and I hunched up my shoulders and pulled my arms in close to my body as I hurried along.

One more block and then I was in my cold coffin of a car, starting it up and quickly shutting off the blower which I’d left on ‘cause it was blowin’ nice and warm when I’d gotten out. The trees waved their branches up and down in the streetlight, making animated pick-up sticks shadows on the pavement as the engine idled a bit. No one else was out and about as I pulled away from the curb and headed on home.

Dammit Harry, why’d you have to go and die just when things were looking up? Harry was the nice old man I’d been renting a room from, just until I could get on my feet. But I came home for lunch today and found Harry sitting awful still in his favorite chair in the living room. The police said he’d died peacefully and since they verified I’d been at my job when Harry’d been granted his wings, they didn’t accuse me of anything.

I had cried. Not that I’m a big baby or anything, but I was gonna miss ole’ Harry. He’d gotten to me and that was unusual. I mean, nothing touches a loner, right? The police said I might want to spend the night somewhere else, but hey. I got no place else to go, right? So I just said no, thanks, I wanted to watch over Harry’s stuff, and they left me alone.

Because I did want to watch over Harry’s stuff. What I hadn’t told the police was that when I came home today, I could tell that someone had been there. It had sprinkled and the driveway had a large spot which wasn’t the same wetness as the rest. And there was a wadded-up paper towel and a newspaper clipping on the front porch. I picked them up and put them in the trash ‘cause ole’ Harry likes to keep things neat, but I wondered how they’d gotten there in the first place. The wind was blowing at the back side of the house not the front and besides, the front had a lot of bushes and things.

So now that the excitement was over and I was in bed thinking back over the day, it occurred to me that maybe Harry hadn’t had such a peaceful exit after all. I thought about it for awhile as I listened to night-sounds through my open-an-inch-even-in-the-wintertime window. The wind had died down and I was finally heading off to dreamland when the nagging that had started in my head a little bit ago finally got my attention. Something or someone was carefully and quietly walking across the porch. Well, wait ... maybe the wind picked up again, blowing at the front of the house this time.

I focused, then listened a bit, then started smoothing back down the road to dreamland, when I heard some kind of clicking at the front door. Then the door opened. Ohmygod, can you die from adrenaline overload? Maybe not, but you can die from other things that I really didn’t want to find out about.

I threw back the covers, grabbed my jeans, boots, and wool sweater, and practically rammed myself through the screen-less window that Harry was never going to get fixed now.

I headed straight for the three pine trees in the corner of the yard and scrunched behind them, trying to get dressed and looking to see if anyone showed up. Slapped my jeans on, slipped the sweater over my head, and crammed my cold tootsies in my shearling-lined desert boots. This was going to work for a little while, as long as the wind didn’t pick up again, but really -- it was simply the wrong time of year to be starting an adventure.

I scoped out the alley, then headed down it, figuring it was only about four blocks to Macy’s farm on the edge of town. There was hay up in the barn and I could sorta keep warm in there. Come morning, though, I was going to have to figure out what to do.