Wheel of Fortune - X
Section Novella of Tarot Blanco
Radio, as dreaded into occlusion,
Open penned everything nascent
Source over undue receiver crash evocatively.
It was a cold opening – a can of Red Bull shooting across at his knees and to the left just missed the open-air wastebasket and finally dropped onto the sidewalk like a cup in hand. It awoke him from a daylight dream reader he was thinking about thinking and trying to figure out who the next guest on his radio show should be. He looked over to the right and saw a quite young man who was fishing inside his backpack, probably for another can to raise himself from the dead by increments of uber-caffeine. With a twist.
To be fair it was a gloomy morning on Charles Street in Boston and even the pigeons were huddled in the nooks and crannies of the transoms at the tops of doors. The young man was already drinking down the next Red Bull and reaching for a paperback book that was torn and had the reverse cover missing, perhaps it was Machiavelli and the prints. He was in plaid pants and a pink shirt. He did not look like he had a next move planned. then Chris saw a red baseball-style cap with the signature M’n’M design.
And so Chris just moved on noting that the energy soft drink was still in fashion among the young. Everything got noted for future reference because whenever knew where the next open source conglomerate was. “But if a man would be alone, let him look at the stars.” And with two cans of Red Bull in the lad, he might just make it. if only the young man for conscious of what it would mean.
Chris looked from side to side of Charles Street, looking near the end where MGH blocked all who passed, and Charles Street Station was erected before it, almost as if a blocker in English football. Ready for action, he thought, and well in for the tackle. But it wasn’t the football kind of tackle that he considered because he was much more cerebral. Words were like the snake that slithers into a conversation, words that can be printed and used when ready.
The screech of traffic registered but did not bother him, instead, he stopped to let an old lady pass then under the gas lamp post and turned left with swift strides into Savenor’s which was the place to get expensive tastes quickly. He wanted breakfast but on his terms. Once under the black awning, He felt the warmth of an electric heater above him and the smells of fresh pastrami, porchetta, and prosciutto crudo bubble into his nose. He, at last, stopped thinking and breathed in the raw smells of freshness. However, he was a repeat customer and knew that there would be a slice waiting for him as soon as the owner could procure it.
And he was not disappointed, because just then he turned, and before he could utter any welcome he was transported by the speck from the hand of the person who had cut it. It was a labor of love like that of the pelican piercing its breast for its child.
So he savored it gently, swallowed, but finally opened his mouth.
“So what do you think of the presidential election in only a week’s time?” His stentorian Voice shook the dust.
“We are safe in the Commonwealth, and MSNBC thinks the chances are good. But you never know, the cause he is like Anubis rolling up through the earth and snatching the clouds.” Of course, “he” was Donald J. Trump, but somehow he would never quite cross the line into the three-letter abbreviation: FDR, JFK, even the devil of Viet Nam: LBJ. There would, he thought, be a sword in that slab of flesh that would never quite heal. Like Water never twining to Air or like Earth never touching Fire.
He also ordered a cup of coffee, black to make himself up and also for his sour countenance which mirrored his disposition. The mirror cracked.
But on the outside, Chris merely nodded sagely, because there was so often a calamity that befalls on election night. Just look at Dubya and the clown show that was reelected until the banking system field under the weight of the mortgage-backed insecurities. The books added up heavily because the snake was in the details. Even the tarot deck had a place in this in the Brown. The wheels were spinning in the grave.
He ordered several things for breakfast and some for lunch, and then passed his way onto the pavement. Even before he hit the sidewalk he was thinking, thinking about how the American public could stand another day of the off-key chorus and his techno-brothers in arms. It was a mystery and a half. Then he looked to the sky and saw the fluffy white clouds, and hoped that that meant there was a pope being elected in a manner speaking. But walking back he could not expunge the darkened belief that there was something peculiar, because he had decided to have one debate only and then restrained himself to platitudes and empty rallies with empty slogans echoing the halls. So it goes, as the Wiseman said.
Then he looked at the Maple trees and was reminded of another quote: “The greatest delight which the fields and woods minister, is the suggestion of an occult relation between man…” and he knew that after the repast, he needed to get on to editing his last program and sign it with his words in poison that went down with a smile.
He drank from the cup and took his sacrament in the cold.