Experiments in Photosynthesis
by Ron Greer
As the stream's waters gently lapped up against his tummy, the boy knew he had found a hidden treasure, some untapped vein of gold, brought down by the run-off of a snow bank up in the hills, which must have loosened the soil and washed the gold deposit down to the stream. He basked in the delight of the smooth pebbles beneath his feet, the sandy grit between his toes, and the golden, yellow sparkle of the gold he had found. There would be a more waiting for him close by, he knew it.
He examined the jagged piece of ore in his hands, his child's brain calculating quietly, time-lapsing the sluice of nature loosing the deposits while dinosaurs and wooly mammoths drank from the stream, over thousands, if not millions of years of run-off. He scratched at the matte of his sandy hair, quietly turning over the nugget in his hand, toying with its sparkle and shifting colors. What would he buy first? What would he get his parents? The kitchen for his mom, the camper for his dad. His expression was almost blank, for all the excitement churning inside, for he was a scientist, and it took the cold hard examination of research to quell the elation before him. He still had work to do. He could see the glittering trail in the stream, heading towards the bank. He pocketed the rock in his trunks, next to the bottle of suntan lotion he promised to take. He had bunched up the waistband, rolling it inward a few times, since they really belong to his cousin. His mother had forgotten to bring a pair.
Realizing he had been playing in the water for a while, the boy dutifully applied suntan lotion to himself, the *spurtch* of the squeeze bottle letting out a little razzberry. He vigorously rubbed it all over his tummy, as if kneading it in would make it work better, then he ran his lotioned hands up and down his flat chest, then closed his eyes, and rubbed the remainder into his face; first the cheeks, then his nose and forehead. He let the bottle float next to him, but like an attentive puppy, it held close by, bobbing in the little waves his body sent to the embankment.
He remembered his dad helping him with the lotion earlier "ex marks the spot buddy boy, that's where you wanna aim. Make sure you get it everywhere." And then his father tickled him and give him a healthy swat into the water.
The boy picked the bottle out of the stream, and a few drops of the lotion still dribbled, and dropped into the water, radiating ripples. He stuffed it back into his trunks.
He had found this area all by hisself, a quiet little jut within the wooded stream. His older cousins were splashing around further along, and had completely passed it by. They didn't wait up for him, so he wasn't going to bother calling them back. A tree dunked one of its branches in for a sip, and the boy wondered if ducks or beavers ever lived here. He could hear the adults, he could even still smell the barbeque, and he got a pang for sour cream & onion chips and a hot dog. But they could wait. He was testing the sandy mud for more of his gold. The ripples his slow, explorer's movement left made him think of cartoon radio waves, and the clouds of muddy water from his plowing made him think of thunderstorm. He found a flat round stone, and tried to skip it like his cousins had shown him. The rock made one dramatic skid, and then plopped into the water.
He heard his name called. "Do you wanna hot dog, or are we eating these all by ourselves?" He heard the splashing upstream start to head in his direction, and that's when he figured he could get back to his search later. His cousins had a way of hogging all the chips.
The boy wanted to show his mom first. She was sitting in a lawn chair looking out across the bank. He duck-walked up to her and shivered a little from having come so quickly out of the water. His mother rubbed his arms with her soft warm hands. He dug into the pocket of his trunks.
"Look what I found..."
She smiled expectantly as he placed the gold into her hand.
"oh, look at this!"
He knew his mom's exclaimation would catch his dad's attention, as he had hoped, but now he had grown shy about their impending fortune. His dad smiled and looked over his mother's shoulder.
"Ah, you found some pirite. That's a pretty good one."
"Huh?" The boy almost thought he said "pirates". He flushed at the thought of having found a pirate's treasure. His mind flooded with images of spanish galleons with billowing sails and clanging swords.
"Fool's gold. It's all over the place, but most of it's just flakes in the water. You got yourself a pretty good chunk there; I don't think you could get anything for it, though."
The boy was crestfallen, but his mother clicked her tongue and turned to his father. "Now dear, please. It's a capital find." She then turned back to her little adventurer. "It's a very pretty rock, darling. Can I keep it?"
Emma watched the empty driveway through the screen door, very worried. Her father said he would be right back, and he hadn't returned yet. A man had come looking for him, a man he knew, and her father didn't want him in the house. "My daughter...let's take this outside. You stay here. I'll be right back." The other man didn't seem to care at all about her; he seemed mad at her father. He briskly went out the door, and the two men loped down the steps and out of site. She knew bad things happened when grown-ups got mad at each other. She wanted to go out there, bring him back inside. Her hand tested the screen; the curls of the aluminum grill were twisted like wrought iron. She could hear them shouting... Emma and her father were getting ready to play checkers when the screen door had rattled with a series of rapid raps upon it, and the other man was standing outside. She stared at the pitcher of blueberry kool-aid she mixed for them.
She thought about calling 911, when she heard her father's steps. His back was to her as he reached for the handle.
"Don't you fucking come back to my house!" Her father turned to look at Emma through the screen, her hand absently picking at the grill. His anger turned to relief, relief turned to guilt. The word upset her. "It's okay baby, I made the bad man go away." He struggled for the right thing to say. "So, do you want to be red or black?"
This game had gone completely to shit. He was covered with mud, the QB was covered in mud, the ball was covered in mud, the first two rows of spectators were fucking covered in mud. The score was past redemption, and quickly sliding into embarrasment. He loosened his chin strap and started thinking about beer. At least that would make these final two minutes bearable.
Cast iron kettle dipped into clay mug, both drizzled with the same rough finish, a glaze of fire or grease. The old woman wore a thick green sweater, cast in the wide but crafted proportions of being handmade, and an apron of flower-sack and burlap. The asymmetrical hat placed haphazard on her head threatened to fall from the bun of her iron grey hair. Her toothless expression betrayed an absent concentration of getting boiling water into cup by way of sucked in lips. Her sunken yet wise eyes examined the steam for some mystical danger, and then she made to return the kettle to the monsterous hook in the fireplace. She still wore his ring, and she held the kettle handle underhanded. The Dutch-carved mantle above was crowded with dog-earred paperbacks and newspapers folded inbetween. At least she was literate, and people would have her read for them. She kept those few vestages of culture, the metropolitan calendar and quilt on the rough stone wall, smatterings of local plaster and floorbeams on the ceiling.
Winston churchill sat quietly on the folding chair, letting the others speak aloud what they knew of him, lauding him, remembering times together. He would have to speak soon enough, to live up to their words. More than enough dignitaries had taken the stage with him, people of stature and rank, people of brains and power. They were all very pleased; with him, with themselves knowing him, with continuing what they wanted him to represent. They applauded, again congratulating either him or themselves, or what they represented together. Always difficult to put up with...The microphones, the lights, the radios. It was now his turn. He looked at the bandshell behind him, and shuffled to the podium, which was placed unevenly on a draped fold-away table. He cleared his throat and wondered if anyone would remember these words today.
The crowd of young men must have numbered in the hundreds, all in their Harvard best, gazing up at the 40-foot inflatable "love doll" floating serenely above them. The lampoon had done it again. They grinned admiringly, realizing their pictures, and not those the gargantuan air-filled nude, would be the ones to grace the front page of the student paper. There they would be, looking like a bunch of gawking dopes hampered by dress code ties and camelhair jackets, regulated to parent-bought khakis and dockers, and no one would have any idea what they were looking at. They stood in the street and on the green, staring dumbly into the sky ... she had nipples the size of pie plates, boobs the size of weather balloons, and a furry thatch between her crevice the size of a bear-skin rug. Passing overhead, She seemed to kick, as to swim through the air, a vulcanized godiva.
For the neighborhood talent show, he had his daughers play the three fates, see no evil, hear no evil, cause no evil. They liked to play dress-up and were every eager to pile themselves with grecian gowns and baubles. In the high contrast lights and shadows of Ms. Henson's living room, where the event was held, they could only make faces or stare with grave resolve as their father played plaintive notes on the recorder. The darkness surrounded them, and they were the only gravitational pull in that universe. Three sisters, each mute in her own goddess-ness.