Page 72 - WTP VOl. X #3

Unto Thee (continued from preceding page)
Like my flaws and...can I complain about other peo- ple? That allowed? Or just all about me? Seems sort of fucked up if it’s only gotta be about me...my friends pissed me off. At the club. Tonight. Priyanka really. She says I’m a mean drunk, but she’s sloppy as shit after two drinks and Felix just stands there, defend- ing her. Excuse, excuse. Never for me, just sticks up for her. So I said fuck it. I’d had enough and just left. Now look where I am.”
The Jesus statute made no reply.
“Okay, okay. Me. I don’t know, I mean...I’m not per- fect. I own that. I don’t think though that I’m some total fuck-up.” He took in a pained breath. “People say I’m...difficult. My friends say I’m a pain in the ass. Like, I don’t assume everything’s always go-
ing to be alright. I don’t fucking trust people.” He sighed and then winced, not wanting to do this, but felt like he no longer had a choice. “I wanted Sasha to be happy. I wanted to make her happy. She didn’t give me a chance. You come and tell me things aren’t good, fine. I can take that. But give me an oppor- tunity to do something about it. She wouldn’t give that to me. ‘Nah, I’m done.’ And on the way out she drops this nuclear fucking bomb. That it’ll always be hopeless ‘cause I’m to—.” He struggled for a mo- ment to catch a sharp, painful breath. “I’m supposed to forget all that?”
The Jesus statue moved its head farther away from him.
“Oh, this not what you want to hear? Cool, let’s talk about you. I don’t believe in you! But I sure cursed you out plenty of times. Like ‘fuck you, I didn’t
get to be a doctor’, and ‘fuck you for letting Sasha leave’, and ‘really fuck you for letting my mom die’. You remember? You heard me when I said all that?” It didn’t sound right coming out of his mouth. Not this time. Now it simply felt petty and cruel. “I was so angry when my mom died.” He imagined her laying in that hospital bed, while the Jesus statue from the First Methodist Church—normally hang- ing from its crucifix behind the altar, sat prostrate in the chair opposite, pleading in a midwestern accent, crying over its failure to rid her body of the all-consuming cancer. It was comical almost, if it wasn’t so deeply sad. She probably would have com- forted it. Told it not to worry. Thanked it for visiting. She had always been such an accommodating per- son, always willing to bend for others, which had driven Jerome nuts since it meant she had so often been taken advantage of. Especially by his father.
“I was angry she died. How she died. When she died. Still am...I’m angry...a lot. Like, a real lot.” This wasn’t anything new, and yet it sounded like a revelation, words falling from his mouth like water from a loos- ened faucet.
Slowly, the Jesus statue turned its head and faced Jerome. Its long, thin nose wasn’t fully proportion- ate to the high cheek bones, and its mouth was set too far down, leading into a small chin. Its ears were set too far back and it had a very high fore- head. The tour guide had told them during their church visit that what was so special about this statue was that it hadn’t been made by a profes- sional artist; rather in the ‘60s, a local fisherman had become divinely inspired and carved from a single felled tree his one and only artwork. Im- perfectly made. Staring at that face, Jerome felt a surprising appreciation for its non-perfection, still- ing some of his bubbling rage.
“It doesn’t go away. What do I do with it? People say, just let it go. Time helps. Think positive. Bullshit. It’s still there. I can’t just turn it off. I want to...but...”
Looking at those wooden eyes that somehow seemed fluid, alive and attentive, Jerome was suddenly curi- ous. He glanced at the trash in the ditch, and then at his own scraped, broken body. “Why would you even bother to try to save me?”
The Jesus statue gently rested its large hand on Je- rome’s shoulder.
“I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t forgive or forget. If I had gone through what you had and some asshole was screaming ‘fuck you’...I wouldn’t be down here, now.”
The Jesus statue looked at him with a pained expres- sion.
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