I sat with Mike and his cousin, Noe, on the porch. They--in flannel shirts and baggy jeans, in open, splayed-limb disregard for obligation--occupied the couch, and I, hopefully covert while doing so, chose the cleanest patio chair. None of us talked, just nodded every so often, sipping beer from glass bottles. After awhile, after Noe complained about "fuckin' starving," Mike ordered pizza.
"Hey Prophet," Mike said, lifting a slice to his mouth, "that one Mateo dude, he’s going rabid about you, dude. He said it’s from when you interrupted his...vanishing?"
"Banishing," Noe corrected, guiding a strand of cheese back onto his pizza.
"Yeah, so I told him that if he wanted to keep coming here, you two would have to sort it out."
While I was fairly certain he didn’t, perhaps Mike meant categorize. "Like fight about it?"
Mike chomped the end of a crust. "Yeah, you know...sort it out."
"But you said everything was cool."
"With me, Prophet. ‘Cause I don’t like fighting in my place, but Nestor and everybody said you stopped some crazy shit from happening, so that was cool, what you did. But if you kick a dude, he’s gonna come back, you know?" Mike slammed an open palm to fist. "And that’s between you and him. Just be careful mixing it up, ‘cause...you know."
He obliquely referenced my wounded face.
Pores leaked bright orange from the cheese on my pizza, running warm over my hand. I waited until the others were distracted--Mike rearranging some toppings, Noe setting down his empty bottle-–to lick it off. And although I planned to worry about the fated fisticuffs with a psycho drug addict from grade school, the immediate goal was simple: stunt my recent memory with alcohol and food.
A child’s voice called out for Mike, which surprised me. Uncle Mike answered, "Out here with Prophet." When I heard the patter of shoes, I half jokingly, half really expected a band of reduced-in-scale Egyptian Mikes. Black-haired and densely-built, sporting goatees thick enough to comb, too-big pants and shirts attempting to hide the wall-smashing bulk of their compacted frames. They worked on bikes, I imagined, and got things in the mail.
Footsteps neared. A child proclaimed, "Can too!"
Mike’s four nephews shot out the front door, spilled into our midst like dice from a cup. They were laughing, completing a footrace to the porch for no prize made them laugh. And they all had blonde hair.
One of them spotted the pizza. "Can we have some?"
"Your mom’s taking you for pizza later. This is for grownups," Mike said.
"But we can have--"
"Just wait for your mom."
They were little, kids were so tiny, so little, I understood in that moment how parents forgot them places or thought their feelings didn’t matter. Was I really ever that small? And Tammy from work, was she? A spoonful each of instant potatoes could power them for days, probably.
"What’s your name?" a random kid asked me.
"That’s Prophet," Mike said.
The Nephew Gang eyed the stranger. "Like from Sunday school?"
The comparison won approval. "Ha ha. Yeah, like that."
Why would you say that? I gestured, palms supine and tilted upward. Mike shrugged, because how else could he have answered that question?
Before the exchange went further, first one, then all, of Mike’s nephews went zooming for the yard, borrowing the urgency and disorder of flabellum-scattered flies.
I asked Mike how old they were.
"Four, five, six, and seven," he said.
The nephews devoted their energy, every second, to combatting stillness. They milled, hopped, and dashed. They randomly or purposefully fell. They attempted handstands and hit trees with sticks, unsettling the local dryads via improvised body horror. They roamed the yard as though it were endless, exploring with undepleted fervor as new dangers and tasks emerged. The rules morphed on impulse, could be vetoed without basis. (Those vines grab you. No, they don’t, they freeze you.) Victory in any scenario could be obtained through declaration, and robots and sharks, zombies and aliens, could all suddenly appear right behind anyone. A neighbor walking by asked the kids what they were playing and was told. Cars drove past; the nephews never stopped, never took an embarrassment break. It was hard to watch.
"Hey Prophet, you okay?"
My head was down.
"Yeah, just a headache. It’s cool."
And then--a battle cry?--sounded from the front lawn. A grownup in a long black coat (a duster?) had joined in, pretending to brandish claws or balls of energy as Mike’s nephews lined up for a fabulous scuffle. Mike didn’t show any alarm, must have known the adult.
"Yeeah!"
"Yeargh!"
The kids rushed in, then, one after the other, fell to the invisible claw-strike of their size-advantaged foe. They laughed, dying made them laugh, and each grunted his farewell. The coat guy mimed an action--retracting claws?--then pointed at me.
"You," he said.
Shit. It was that Mateo dude, and he’d been awake since our last encounter.
Mike urged me off the porch with a single, slow nod. If I wanted to be there, I had to follow the rules, which meant accepting a parley with the insane. Byssus bound my fate. After checking for pizza grease on my hand, I headed for the yard. The nephews returned to life as an audience.
"He’s a prophet," one of them announced, finger aimed at me.
"I know," Mateo said, offended at the notion that he didn’t know.
At the risk of disappointing Mike and his cousin, I brainstormed a diplomatic solution. How about I get on my knees, and you kick me! Or you know that bizarre ritual I wanted to perform? I don’t have to! Mateo stood with his head tilted forward, glaring hard through a veil of brown hair. His arms hung stiffly down his sides as though weighed down by heavy pails. In his mind, his coat flared menacingly in a raging zephyr, and all around him shards of earth splintered, flaked away, then floated skyward.
I walked right up to him--hands at my sides--to begin peace talks.
"Mateo, man, I know you’re upset with me, but--"
He pumped his arms, left-right-left. A shot on the upper lip, then on the throat, completely disoriented me. A minute ago I wasn’t sitting on Mike’s porch--I was in Ruth’s bedroom, crawling and bleeding on the floor, leaving unanswered a question about decapitated soap. I stood up again.
"Fellow prophets aren’t supposed to meddle!"
I flinched at the scream. A flourish of black fabric grazed my temple. As a follow-up to the missed punch, Mateo charged at me. To get away, I basically toppled over, landing on the heels of my hands, my chest. Mateo fell from natural lack of coordination (although it looked like a giant inkblot had tackled him from behind). When I got up, I noticed Mike’s nephews were still in the yard, watching. I couldn’t tell if they rooted for me or not.
Mateo had recovered, walking forward as though convinced that if he ran into me I would disappear.
"For Valentine’s Day, you gave Jennifer a chocolate bar tied with a bow, a red ribbon."
I catapulted a long-range payload with a trajectory spanning fifteen years. The impact would level his barriers to memory, flood his mind with a recollection of our shared past. Drown the combativeness inside that body stalking toward me.
His pace slowed, and the killer robot march-step began to slacken. Then, according to my prediction, he stopped advancing. Due to lack of interest, this fight has been called off. My scheme had converted belligerence to peace. It was alchemy, and it was amazing.
Mateo spoke. "After I perform a song at your funeral, ‘The Ballad of Greg the Ruiner,’ I’m going to smash the guitar on your dead fuckin’ face."
And so, the fight was officially back on because Mateo didn’t say "I can’t believe you remember that" like I planned. How could I reason with TV static? How could I corral the F5 craziness of a mind that believed in demons and spell casting and--
"Fuck this. Fuck you."
I turned an L-stance to Mateo, drawing both hands to my rear hip as though cradling between them an invisible object. This got him to put his hands down.
"What are you doing?"
I didn’t answer, just hurled silence from the cannon of a scornful look. I exaggerated the rise and fall of my shoulders while breathing, called attention to my wickedly formed fingers. I circled, always staring at the enemy, the buildup of something unknown reaching palpable, leaf-stirring levels.
"You fucking parasite. You can blame only yourself for what I’m about to do."
A nephew yelped. Noe, I think, almost did. I crouched lower, the molded force in my hands needing further restraint, the distant drums, the ownerless chants in my head, marking the power increase by hastening tempo. "By the jawbone of Ahriman, I summon the pain of all persecuted souls that I may accumulate--then unleash--a torment so great even the most intrepid scribe shall bar his quill from its record, seeking not the dispensation of horror to be his legacy."
I kept circling. The movement wound a fantastic tension, traced a boundary in which magic could happen.
"To crush those who might strike me is my only purpose. Until opposed, my every action is a farther step from destiny. Your sacrifice to give me true worth is noble; so my honor, therefore, precedes my wrath."
Mateo’s eyelids stretched open, stayed open--his attempt at multiplying the cells of his corneas for the creation of twin fibrous shields lingering in the concept stage. I pushed my hands forward, unfurling what he hopefully believed was a concentrated sorrow-blast.
"Ungh!"
Nephews gasped. Mateo glared at me, I didn’t deserve this, he relayed emphatically. A feeling, stronger than hate, must drive you, he accused with another look. Clutching his sides to contain their viscid flight from body, Mateo staggered around the yard, turning, stopping, then lurching again--a drunk bee crashing through an invisible maze.
"This isn’t over," he hissed, sucking air for a few seconds before sprinting away.
"Fuck yeah," Mike laughed.
A victory. I went inside to celebrate, telling Mike’s nephews I’d show them "how I did that magic thing" later.
Mike greeted me with two pills. "Hey Prophet. Take this."
"And this," Noe said, handing me a beer.
"Cool," I said, easing onto the couch, "what is it?"
"Good shit," Mike answered, turning on the TV then reclining his chair to watch.
I accepted. Twenty minutes later, torpor slowly crushed Wakeful Greg’s windpipe with a bed sheet.
"I’m not just...some novelty dude. We’re real friends, man."
Wailing laughter, then sleep, blotted my effort to share insight. Eigengrau blocked the words...
#
Specters of a crowded living room flashed between bites of pastrami hash. It was breakfast. I sat at the kitchen table.
"Thanks," I said, realizing I’d broken my vow to never use the silverware at Mike’s.
"Hey Prophet, is everything okay?" Mike asked. He stood with his back turned to the kitchen sink.
"Yeah, man. Potatoes are good."
"I’m talking about last night. You said some shit about your world getting kicked off the table, and how the cocks would travel through space to find you."
I shrugged. "I was fucked up, right?"
"It wasn’t your normal shit."
I stared at my food. "I’m fine. The point was to leave reality for a bit--"
"Listen. I think all that is your reality."
Mike was no longer the stout schemer having fun until his next move. The machismo twitch faded from his body. The gleam of anticipation left his eyes. Drying glasses with a towel and still wearing the sweatpants he used for pajamas, my drug dealer became unnervingly parental.
"Are you planning to...hurt some people? Like, tie them up? You said some crazy shit--"
"No, man. No way. No. I don’t remember saying that."
Mike stared at me for a few seconds. "Whatever, it’s cool. But seriously. If you need help with anything--and Prophet, listen to me, just let me know, alright?"
"Yeah. For sure. Um...black pepper?" I joked.
Mike handed me a grinder while shaking his head.
The whole world could hear me chew. Mike needed to buy a window shade for his kitchen. I fucking hated pastrami. Ruth was a bitch--
#
"Prophet, o prophet! Face me, you coward!"Mateo and his coat, on a kids’ bike. He pedaled infinity out in the street, whooping my name amid ramblings and contrived laughter. That fucker had found my apartment. I looked around for neighbors as embarrassment stuck a hot plate under my blood.
"The day has come! For you, o mighty prophet! Did you foresee? Foresee it now, gaze upon me now!"
I thought I’d never see him again. He was an aberration, a story for later, an event I’d never be sure happened in wakefulness or a dream. He probably pictured himself astride an archaeopteryx, fuck it, for some reason it came with two wheels, and the flowing black from his shoulders was a guardian entity, living darkness enshrouding its lord. My reckoning, heralded by reflectors, brought forth on the clumsy operation of handlebars. It seemed a fifty percent chance his coat would tangle in the spokes.
"Blight! Pox! Plague on you!" Mateo screeched, hurling in my direction the contents of an empty hand.
So I fucking clotheslined him, intercepted his route. Ran into the street then stopped hard, clubbed his forehead with the mail crane, which dismounted him. He landed on his back, hair covering his face, coat spread like a pool of blood from a much greater impact.
"That bike better be okay," he warned, already on his feet.
I turned my head toward the fallen machine. Mateo occupied this lapse in awareness, stepping forward to drive a steel toe into my scrotum. The blow crumpled my abdomen while flaring a line of pain through my chest and neck and jaw. I knelt, fell to my side.
"A curse, prophet. There’s nothing you can do."
My legs depressurized, became unliving sausage logs. The vise in my pelvis exponentially tightened. Pain born in my testicles emigrated, colonizing my kidneys and lower back. Life, I could feel it unspooling, could feel the rings of disorder spread from between my legs.
"Nothing, prophet, only--"
An uppercut. I raised enough turgidity to kneel for a split second, pushing my knuckles into the hanging parts of Mateo before collapsing again. He fell next to me, landing so close we could have been sharing a bed and lied farther apart.
A car honked. Our bodies blocked the road.
"They’re both holding their balls," someone remarked.
I got up, hunched and hovering near a quadrupedal stance, stumbling onto the parking lot to sit, recover. After un-wadding the wince on my face, I noticed Mateo had returned to a fighting stance. Goddamn it, I can’t lose again. Don’t, don’t, don’t--
I’m not sure how many times he kicked me in the head before knocking me out.
