the gilled and the guileless

Boscov’s didn’t have the shoes she wanted

for the wedding. “Can we find the kindness

rocks at Brookdale?” The polished pebbles

with the positive proverbs. I nodded and ate

my slider, of which the best parts were the

two slices of pickle. The Creature from the

Black Lagoon was a fisherman who fell into

a pickle jar. Do you remember how he swam

with you in your dreams? How he made you

unafraid of the large white eyes of the whales

and showed you the love in their hearts was

as big and wide and crazy as yours? Neither

of us knew how to get to the college, where

the poorly illuminated high rent low profile

roads were taking us. Our arrival on campus

was unceremonious, our only greetings from

deer who saw their ancestors in our car’s lights

as we tried to find our way. I turned quiet as

she drove, thinking about “Move-In” day at

S.U. nearly twenty-five years ago. Orange-

shirted upperclassmen, “The O-Team”, rushed

the freshmen strong armed and strong smiled

into the residence halls, as my parents prodded

while unpacking my wrestling tees and torn blues.

Are you sure you want to be here? Don’t say too

much, you’re not in high school, you have a fresh

start here, I don’t want any jerkoff spray-painting

nasty language on my driveway anymore. My god,

your roommate is a giant. Are you sure you want

to be here? Grandma’s crumbcake is not to be

shared unless it’s with a pretty girl. We love you,

don’t turn into a chimney, find a girl. A stomped

Marlboro expires by a broken payphone; that means

the killer got away. A librarian exits a building,

and I take an anti-killer posture and gait as I walk

towards her with my Jackass cap in my hands

to ask for directions to the kindness rock garden.

(“No, officer, he removed his hat, so I didn’t think

he was a killer…the knee to his groin? Oh, that was

an attack to his…”) “Kindness rocks? Yeah, wow,

I’m so happy you’re here! I’ll show you!” She takes

us through the student center brisk of pace and firm

of mission, but the sensory overload of memories

from freshman year clamp my ankles and arrest me

I hate boys, Brandon, but not you. Let’s eat Twix

on the floor by the vending machine until we’re on fire.

You’ve never had a girlfriend? I find that hard to

believe. She has a guy at home, do you didn’t know?

I find that harder to believe. We couldn’t talk her

off the roof, she thought she was an emu and needed

to fly into the bedroom of her ex-boyfriend at the

University of Vermont. Read the encyclopedia, Carrie,

emus cannot fly. Did you climb onto the roof with an

encyclopedia to tell me I can’t fly? What kind of bird

are you? I’m an extinct Dodo, and I don’t want your

company in ornithological obscurity. Brandon, I want

to get ice cream with you right fucking now; get me

off this roof. She’s gone, Brandon. Her mom took her

home. She was screaming for you last night and had a

breakdown. Where were you? I’m still picking at my

arms with pushpins trying to remember. Cassiopeia

smiles for you, Sara. We are going to survive this

Physics exam. Brandon, you had a 99 and I had a

97, why did that happen? We shouldn’t have studied

together, I was distracted by..by us. I’m going to bed

but first I’m going to run around the track until this

makes sense to me. Sara ran into the arms of Sunday

morning and a slender thread of sinew and stride that

magically turned into her future husband. You’re sitting

in my favorite chair, Sherry. Right, because we are

going to play a game. I’ve hidden your backpack in

the dorm, in the buttcrack of Nowheresville, until

you dance with me. Just one dance. Tell me again

how you skipped prom so you could featherdust

pornos in the video store where you worked. It’s so

romantic. My wife and I are shown the garden of

kindness rocks and our picture taken for the college’s

Instagram. My soul burps. You don’t show your teeth,

why? It’s a face for radio. Bob’s Bong Wraps Around

the Room: there’s a name for an instrumental guitar

jam. My knowledge of recreational drugs is buried

under the shed in my backyard. But I don’t know

where the bodies went. Cute humor, Dark and Dorky,

but I’m not in love yet. Yet. She told me she was

exhausted, and I was overgrown. I don’t know

when I’ll loosen the chains, but I am aware the

links are rotting. She has reclaimed from the

wreckage, salvaged saltwater energy redirected,

and I am the Creature from the Black Lagoon.  

“You got this; you know you do” is the painted

inspiration of one rock. “Take that one home,”

she suggests. I got this. I know I do. It’s got me.

It knows it does. That night is serenaded by a

late winter thunderstorm. But I don’t get out of

the water because I am the Creature of the Black

Lagoon and my memories always bubble to the

surface. Maybe you will show your kindness by

skipping those rocks at them.