JONAS, PROVIDENCE

by Conor Robin Madigan

Once again, Richard sleeps on a toilet. Jonas the barkeep enters the Permanent's bathroom to long snores, geriatric breath, guttural sound, some sighs, and Jonas whispers: "Fuck me. Richard, would you please not sleep in the damn stall," as he pisses and shakes the words damn stall. Appellation to a higher power, an inner power, some upper order; enigmas of upper, higher, over, mock Richard. Richard's sobriety finds memory, tortured sleep, constant thirst, rampant anger, and white anxiety. Lost, damaged, haggard, and wayward Sheila enters his mind's eye, occludes his higher power, his upper order, and leaves a shattered maligned self, full of her voice, her timbre before death. How sharp she was. Sheila tore him from calm, from slow days, and got him frantic for her. Their first affair met in the same bathroom, lockdoored, and a pull of her dress made her naked and she pounced Richard with only excitement to keep him from his zipper. Richard recalls her rump's soiled shine from grime tiled bathroom floor, her hair a slick shag of oil and tangles like a psychotic's. To Jonas's whisper Richard responds, "Jo, I'll need help to my room."
"'Course, but clean up yourself, 's just past six and we've th'eaters in." Jonas waits and throws his towel over his shoulder. Richard says, okay, undoes the door so Jonas may lift his body to stand safe, arms under arms, led from stall to mirror where Richard avoids Jonas's eyes, and as shamed mirror lookers look at mirrors, only addresses himself with short glances, wipes spittle and splashes, readies for public. We're fine to get ourselves to our room. Fine then.
"We're fine enough Jo, for--shit," he vomits. "Joe, I been meanin' to thank you for puttin' me up." Jonas gives him a good whack on his shoulder and nods in the mirror. Just out backdoor from Jonas's hand, and on to his room he cowers moments at foot of his bed, decides clothed sleep, and a fall to sleep, but he cannot sleep. His face hurts. His body aches face first. A roll over and he sees letter paper and pencil next his pillow. I don't want to write, I'd rather die than write. There's a place for this and it's not here. He grabs the paper and writes, Dearest Daughter, You can guess what your mother died of: too much smoking inside, and opiates and drinking, and well… a hitch of junk, and a car ride off the cliff—well, which one? Improsperously, her car didn't kill her. A respite in her slow heartbeat, with some trauma to her brain, fetched her coma in the hospital where she died of respiratory pneumonia. Happily, your grandparents took darling you as an infant, with connictations to their daughter's nefarious lifestyle, and the little girl urchin. Most Humbly Obligated, Your father Richard. He rolls away from his writing. Again, he rolls back, grabs another sheet and writes, Liam, O'Reilly was in his thirties paralleling me in my twenties. He hired me on for fieldwork. I had a vain belief of private revelation for Mrs. O'Reilly, Deb, who jogged in front of her fat dawdling husband in her tightest enthusiastic swimwear. By guidance of O'Reilly, I attempted sobriety, at this point, for most daylight hours. But, as summer cooled to fall, jackets were worn; flasks pocketed, and early October became my return to drink and departure from O'Reilly's humble offer. Oh, fuck it all, I can't be a father to you, you're my father's boy, you're Mahoney's boy, who've always wanted you, cared for you while I waste. A man, Richard. Aoife, he writes, If anything I'll make you laugh. Two thirty, on Main Street outside The Permanent, and I had tyrannically rebutted a biker couple who'd accidentally kicked me. I was on the ground. The two stood over me yelling back. Eventually Kelly'd finished inside and came out to hear me scream an emphatic, "Cunts!" "Richard!" Yelled Kelly, "you're better than that." "Sorry, pa." I quieted as I stumbled in front of my father, then stood and apologized, sloughing all off and off to the overpass for a nap.
Love, Richy