Maceo looking in the mirror thinking, When you ever learn? Still thinking that there wasn’t much point in talking to himself because no matter what he says he doesn’t much listen if what he says is suggesting he stop dreaming. Now looking down at his hands, the right one with the toothbrush, still thinking, I did love her – then, correcting himself, I do love her, can’t help it. Love….God almighty, what was I thinking.

That’s when he first saw the angel, looking like shower steam but the shower wasn’t on, then taking shape, morphing into, no shit, an elderly man with snow white hair, gray twinkling eyes. Maceo, toothbrush frozen mid-air, wondering, Can you still have acid flashbacks if you haven’t done acid in 35 years?

The angel now saying, “No, I’m not a flashback.” Maceo thinking, That doesn’t make this better, because then who are you. The angel now answering the unspoken question, “I’m not a flashback, Maceo.”

Maceo saying, “Pardon?”, trying to buy some time, wondering if he has the number for the emergency room and if not can he remember the number for 9-1-1.

“I’m not a flashback, my boy. You know that now.”

Maceo weaving, sure he was either dying or on his way to a rubber room with different color building blocks.

“You think maybe you should sit down?” the angel gesturing to the open bathroom door and the living room on the other side.

Maceo, looking at the toothbrush, dropping it, foolishly thinking, I might need both my hands.

The angel moved past him into the living room, as he passed Maceo smelled lilacs. He followed the angel into the living room. The angel, nodding towards the ugly orange chair, saying, “Why don’t you sit in your chair. We’ll talk…”

Maceo sitting, the angel now sitting on the couch opposite, smiling. Maceo wondering, What now? Then, looking at the angel, “What’s your name?”

The angel smiling, “That’s pretty much up to you.”

“How you figure?”

“I’m your angel…you can pick any name you want.”

“My angel.. You mean you’re my guardian…” he couldn’t finish, the angel helping, nodding, Yes. Maceo adding, “I’m sober, you know.”

“I do, yes. We’re very proud of you.”

Maceo deciding he’s not asking who the we is since he was having a tough enough time wrapping his mind around the fact that he either had a guardian angel or he’d finally lost his fucking mind.

“What name do you like?”

” I don’t know, I’ve never named an angel before.”

“I know.”

“Paul, I think, Paul. I used to be a Paul.”

“Paul it is then.”

“Angel Paul, has a nice ring to it, kind of a blue collar angel.”

“Then it’s the perfect name.”

Maceo, wagging his head, asking, “What do you want?”

Angel Paul answering, “No, it’s what do you want?”

“I love her you know.”

“I do know, yes. You miss her too.”

“Then I do have a question…”

To be continued……

Micky cracks his knuckles and I think if maybe he cut his hand off instead, problem solved. But that’s just me. Since I was a kid I always figured the quick way to solve things. Not always the best ways, this I know, but if you want speed, I’m your man, or way back, your boy. I can’t figure out why anybody cracks their knuckles in the first place. Like what happens? You’re breezing down the street one day and your knuckles stiffen up and you think, Fuck it, let me crack these bad boys, and you do and somehow something’s all better? Got me.

Now he looks across the table from me, says, “So what were you saying about her?”

The her is Tammy. I met Tammy just a few days back and I’m all caught up in thinking maybe some magic may be happening here except she lives more then 100 miles from me so whatever made me think I can dream. And anyway, Micky and his fuckin’ knuckles have me all out of sync. And I’m not saying shit to him about how I don’t much like the sound of cracking knuckles because it’s always the same response when I do. Someone cracks their knuckles, you say, Why do you do that? Or, Jesus, that’s fucked sounding, and they always go, This bothers you? And crack their knuckles all over again.

I want to think about Tammy. I take a deep breath, trying not to let Micky see I’m taking this breath, because I don’t feel like answering any questions, and start all over.

“Remember I was giving that talk this week? Well, she was there. I mean kind of floating in and out of the room a little in the beginning, way in the back, but man, she came in and that was it. I noticed. You couldn’t not notice. So I’m giving this talk – “

Micky, looking at his knuckles like maybe they needed another go, “What was you talking about?”

“Doesn’t matter, bro. Anyway, when she left the room at first I felt like this empty space inside and I’m thinkin’, What the fuck? I’ve never even seen this person in my life, and she comes into this room, maybe a minute, then leaves, and I’m feeling an empty space inside? What the fuck?”

Micky decids to leave his knuckles be – for now. “She pretty?”

“Yeah, she’s pretty. But it’s more than that. Real. Like you take one look and all this substance just fills you up.”

“So what happens?”

“Nothing. Well, not exactly nothing, yeah, nothing. Not really though. So I’m done with the talk and things and people are coming up and talking to me and I’m listening ‘cause I really do give a shit what they’re saying but most of me wants to say, Excuse me, and go out in the halls and run up and down to see if I can find this woman.”

“And what if you did? Whattaya do then? Hi, there, How you doing> I think you look real?”

“Wasn’t even necessary, and no, I’m not gonna say, Hi, you look real. So these people are talking to me and there’s few left and whattaya think? The door opens and guess who comes in?”

“Miss Real.”

“Exactly.”

“What’d you do?”

“Nothing.”

“Whattaya mean nothing?”

“She asked me some questions about the talk; I answered”

“That’s fucked up man. You shoulda asked her for coffee or something,” and damned if Micky didn’t crack his knuckles again.

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In the feathered skin-to-skin embrace of touching hands, the whispered clasp of fingers slipping through fingers, palms meeting pressing, then the ache of hungry hearts seeking soul-to-soul closeness, taste-on-taste breathing in of animal smells, all the depth, all the warmth.

And there now, the lips touching breast to chest to breast to chest, words like dreams pumped into flowing air from ear to ear, the rain rhythmic off a half -closed window finds deeper things, peels back dreams barely dared and hungrily hoped for, a starvation quenched, finally, tears now mingling.

All is one and joy and one again.

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