Gehenna Was a Real Place!

by Micah Ray

The ‘Blue Apron’ came as an engagement gift from his brother—twelve boxed dinners paid in full to celebrate a proposal to which I did not say yes. It was the third time Luke had asked to marry me, but the first with a ring. He bought it with money earned by whoring his body to med-students, who fed him kale and almonds, and scanned his brain in dream, and drained—daily!—his blood and come, searching their molecules (?) for change. He told me this after I pulled him off his knee, asked what he was doing, etc. I said I couldn’t marry him if he had to sell a kidney to rent a house I don’t even wanna live in. I was (half) kidding, but he got his feelings hurt, and said, “I hope you find a guy who can buy you an island, and I hope he cheats on you when you’re pregnant.” I screamed, slapped him, and drove us to his brother’s house. He’s a (youth) pastor, and Luke looks up to him. I told him what Luke said, and I told him to, “Make it not so!” Pastor-brother told us forgiveness was less an idea, more an event, and, if we wanted, he would lead us to the source. We talked all night, opened the Bible, laid (most) our cards-on-the-table. Then, Luke asked again, but I still said no, and I did not tell him his child was three weeks more than an idea. 

So two days later—yesterday—Luke invited our new neighbor to dinner. I was crying (from Blue Apron’s onions) as I lobbed a half-hearted rejection, “These meals only serve two,” but he said, “Just cook more pasta, please, my darling dove.” He said the guy’s name is Drew, he lives in the apartment upstairs, and he’ll make us smoked cocktails. New people were Luke’s new interest—he’d just gone to see David Sedaris, and had started carrying a spiral notebook to record the subtle inflections of people he eavesdropped on in bars. Luke is a boy-man of phases and hobbies, and for eight years I’ve been the only one he hasn’t quit. 

I was cooking more pasta when neighbor-Drew came in, said “Hi,” and started smoking cocktails. At first he ignored me (and the cat [we have a cat]) and this relieved and offended me as he showed Luke the blowtorch like it was a carburetor only he’d understand. I sautéed the onions and looked at Drew peripherally: he seemed just done with being young, silver-haired, beige-yellow teeth and acne scars, but a lean, athletic body. He reminded me of me when I refused rehab in favor of triathlons, in that he did not look ‘good’ but you sensed this was the better alternative to whatever came before. Drew asked if I was okay with egg white in the cocktail—he said it gives the drink structure, and the booze will kill the salmonella. Who could argue with that? He made us drinks, I made our dinner, but as Luke was showing off his Death Cab vinyl, Drew blew the blowtorch at the cat’s face. The flames got so close! 

Luke said, “Yo, bro, chill,” and Drew said, “Oh, damn, my bad.” 

The cat, with the fluff and color palate of a polar bear, ran to my shins. Luke had named him Hampton, because we found him abandoned in a Hampton Inn—we went into our room, and the cat was just there, a mint on a pillow. I said no, Luke said yes, I go with the bit, cook more pasta. 

When we sat down to dinner, Drew raised a toast. On his bicep was a tattoo of a water gun, pointed, it seemed, at an Oak tree. 

He told us, “It’s so rad to have good neighbors. At my last place, in Fayetteville, I lived in a tiny apartment with the lowest ceiling beneath these college frat girls, maybe two or ten of ’em, and they’d party hard, and late, and at the time, my bed had these really long—” he burped “—legs. They were super high off the ground, and one night, I was so pissed at the noise that I flipped the bed over and sawed the legs down to stubs. To be farther from the noise. I was doing so much coke then. I had no accountability.” 

Luke said, “Holy cow!” 

I said, “Yup, that’s coke.” 

We were still (like idiots) holding up our drinks. 

“Cheers.” 

“Cheers.” 

We touched glasses and drank. The cocktails were definitely smoked. I took another sip and asked Drew what he did. 

“For money?” he asked. 

“Forgiveness,” I said. 

Luke was looking at me, looking at Drew. I didn’t mean to be weird, but it had been on my mind, and I liked the way the word sounded like water, rushing over cold stones. 

“I’m sorry,” said Drew. “My manners are shit. What’s your name?” 

“Echo. And I was kidding. But do you work around here?” 

“But you’re not kidding that your name is Echo, right?” 

“Correct!” 

“Nice. I invest, and do environmental work for the state.” 

“What sort of work?” asked Luke, leaning in, touching his pocket for his notepad. 

“Whatever they need. Lately, they’ve had me out by Vacaville, taking down the watch-out-for-deer signs. Next week we’ll put in these new ones that are all puns about not getting a DUI. To make you chuckle when you think of how awful it’d be to risk your life!” 

When Luke’s intrigued, his eyes narrow in focus, but his bottom lip hangs open—it makes him look confused. Not that he’s dumb, just that he (too easily?) forgets himself. A look of wisdom that didn’t reach its potential. 

He asked, “But why take down the deer signs?” 

“Well, there aren’t any more.” 

We waited. 

“Deer,” said Drew. 

“Oh!” said Luke. 

“There aren’t enough to warrant the funding. They showed me the numbers. By 2050, there’ll be more DUIs per year than there are deer, alive.” 

“Good God,” I said. 

“Right?” said Drew. “Down we go.” 

Luke, attempting a kind of rescue, offered, “I’ve heard DUIs make the state a lot of money.” 

Drew pointed to him and drank. “More than deer, that’s for sure.” 

I turned my groan into a question, “Remind me, hon, who used to live upstairs?” 

Luke, who’s an otherwise serious person for someone ever unemployed and under a backwards hat, said, “The older woman, I think her name was Peggy. We’d get her mail sometimes. She kept to herself, we didn’t see her much.” 

“She sure was quiet,” I said. 

“The best neighbor,” agreed Drew. 

I said, “Lonely old people make me so aware of the body. The heart thumping from an energy both finite and sourceless, the squelch and squeeze of the liver and kidneys, how these miracles turn to tragedies, and for what? Errands and Jeopardy. Oh, Luke.” I reached out my hand and put it atop Luke’s, but it wasn’t Luke’s, it was Drew’s—he was sitting to my right (where Luke usually sits). I corrected this quickly. 

“Cold hands,” chirped Drew. 

I pulled my hands to my lap. The brush against my ankle wasn’t the cat, but Drew’s flannel pants. 

“I never saw a moving truck for her,” said Luke, aiding my recovery. “But who knows, we’ve been gone some. Did you see a moving truck, hon?” 

“I think I might have.” 

Luke shrugged. Drew seemed to chew his food into dust. 

I told them, “You can go through so much life knowing so little. Drew, let’s fire up another round of alchemy.” It’s true: I would trade all the gold in every bank to stay in the feeling of starting the second drink. He said he’d caramelize some rosemary; I told him that was heaven. 

He went to the counter and did his thing. I looked at Luke; he wasn’t looking at me. The last time we were at a dinner party, I told his brother that he (Luke) needs a blowjob every time the Warriors lose—I joked about the year Curry was injured, said by the end of the season I had the neck of a bodybuilder! We’d gone over to ask what the Bible says about bringing a child into a burning world. This was a year ago, when the fires were bad, and a child was just an idea. He said the word Jesus used for hell was ‘Gehenna,’ and that it was a real place, just down the road. He told us, ‘The hell down there is really up here, so the goal is to bring the heaven up there, down here.’ So that night we talked about ethereal fires and real ones while drinking French 75s in coups. It’s amazing: the little worlds you conjure in a living room. 

Drew came back with the second round. “Gin, lime, and a passion fruit syrup. And stir it with the rosemary!” 

“Immaculate! So Drew, why did you leave Arkansas?”

His mouth wasn’t dirty, but he wiped it with the napkin. He turned his lips in against each other, then hesitated. “I know we just met, but is it okay if I answer that question?” 

Eyes wide, I nodded. Getting to know strangers is the best way to appreciate the fever dream theater show of humans on Earth. 

“This is a safe space,” assured Luke. 

Drew put his forearms on the table and made his hands into vertical fists. “Few months ago, two things happened around the same time: a sex offender moved into the apartment beneath me, and, around then, my own apartment began to shrink. I didn’t know if these things were connected. I didn’t know if it was really happening! But, happening or not, either way, I needed a fresh start.” 

As though we’d joined bodies and souls, I felt Luke’s (and my) neck straining to not look at each other. All I could do was lean into the minor miracle that the sex offender was not the natural follow up. I took my last bite and asked, “Shrink? How so?”

“Well, the guy moved in, knocked on my door, told me this and that, and from then on, the walls and floor and ceiling started coming toward each other. First, I couldn’t open the fridge, then the oven. In the bathroom, my knees were up against the wall when I’d sit to shit. Eventually I couldn’t get in the front door. I went out for eggs, came back, and couldn’t get in. And look. I know how weird and impossible and just totally wacko that is, and to hear this from a new neighbor is awkward as hell, if not downright spooky, and makes you think it’s best you keep away from me. But if you could imagine what it’s like to go through life with a thing you can’t say, well then maybe, you could forgive me, for wanting to tell you now, rather than later, when you’d built up a normal image of me in your head, and then realized: you’re wrong. Cause I know that feeling. It sucks!” 

I nodded, licked my teeth and watched his fists release their grip on nothing. His fingers expanded slowly, like crumpled paper becoming (just a little) less crumpled. 

“There’s courage in your vulnerability,” said Luke. 

“But what matters is I’m glad it happened. I needed to set things right. And here, now, I get to.” 

Luke sat up and took a deep breath, but all he said was, “I’ll get started on dishes.” 

I squeezed his hand. “Darling, sit. You love human connection. Drew, how bout one last round?” 

“Do you have some vermouth?” 

“Enough for a village.” 

“Say less.” 

He went to the kitchen. I tapped my head, rubbed my tummy, and made my ear lobes dance. 

Luke whispered, “I guess we’ll get on Zillow tonight.” 

I slapped his hand, “Oh, write down the shape of his nose. He’s strange, it’s nice.” 

“But what the hell was that?” 

I shrugged. “Who hasn’t reworded their worst, skipped town, and charmed new neighbors?” In the kitchen, the blow torch howled.

“He’s not telling us everything.” 

“How much do you want?” I kissed him and squeezed his member, and he settled down nicely. Sometimes it feels like our bit is better than life. Drew came back with (smoking) cinnamon sticks in neat Manhattans. There was a kind of magic to the cold drink’s warmth; it made me think, I once had a father who prayed, and believed people were good, but for whom will I be that? Then Luke, growing into a man I might, maybe, conceivably, want to be with, asked our neighbor, “What does it look like, to set something right?” I like a straight, firm question, equally direct and open-ended, like, ‘How will you provide for your child?’

Drew’s Adam’s Apple glugged, a little after shock after swallowing. He laughed—a wet, sputtering, incredulous laugh—then looked at his empty plate, and stared up at Luke. I felt something like fear, or fear’s cousin. Then, inexplicably, he pulled a piece of taffy from his pocket—pink and wrapped in white wax paper—and ate it. I simply couldn’t believe this. Chewing, he said, “Show up, and do good.” But his answer had the tone of a question. The reaching and wonder of dialogue in dream.

I said, “When Luke’s brother went to seminary, he learned that forgiveness, for it to happen, needs a mechanism. And he said the mechanism is more of an event, than an idea.” I looked at Luke. “Right hon?” 

“Is that right?” he asked, devolving. 

“It is,” I said. “He told us about Jesus sending the pigs off the cliff. He called it an ‘inversion.’ The hurting-person is saved, and the mob is killed. I know it made sense when I heard it, but now it’s just out of reach.” 

“You know the Christians,” said Luke. “Jesus is the answer.” 

“Oh no, I mean yes, but it was more than that. He said you don’t have to kill your enemy, because Jesus was already killed for them. It was air-tight when he said it. I liked the feeling of getting it.” 

Certain that Drew was the sex offender, I reached out my hands, grabbed Luke’s and Drew’s fingers. Their knuckles were dry and their hands were wet from the dew on the glasses. They felt remarkably similar. I closed my eyes and forgot who was whom. Then I told them to hold hands. I wanted to pray.

After a desert of Oreo’s, ice cream and Port, Luke did the dishes and I went upstairs (to see Drew’s place). The floor plan of the apartment was identical to mine: a narrow hallway that opened to a square bedroom, small living room and sad kitchen. In the living room, some leafy plants were struggling beside the window, and he’d left a cheap candle burning on a coffee table small enough for the shrinking home he’d fled. A kitty clock hung on the wall, wagging its tail above a stack of dumbbells, and I was trying to understand why this was strange when he showed me his collection of DVDs, within which were a dozen seasons of The Simpsons. 

I sang, “Spider Pig, Spider Pig, does whatever a Spider Pig does.”

Drew joined, and we sang together, face to face, unblinking. Before my ‘appointment,’ yesterday, I’d imagined singing that song to my child. Now, with Drew, we laughed, and I cried, and fell into his chest for a hug. Then he kissed the top of my head. What a wild motherfucker. In terms of a mechanism, I thought I wouldn’t not jack him off.

I asked his chin, “Do you still sleep on the bed with the sawed off legs?” He was squeezing my triceps. His breath smelled like a humid a dive bar with a descending ceiling. 

“Don’t laugh, but I’m on the couch for now.” He nodded towards the couch. The slip cover was blue and sun-stained and had some holes with brown-burned edges. I smelled cigarettes and trash competing with the Pomegranate candle. 

He asked if I wanted to invite Luke up to watch some Simpsons. I told him to show me the rest of his place. Then, from down the hall, someone said, “Drew.” It was faint but clear and had the tone of some deep, eternal groan. “Drrruuu,” the voice called. “Drrruuu?” He moved his grip down to my hands. His eyes, wolf blue, were calling up from a sewer I’d been walking over my whole life. 

He whispered, “I’ll come back.” 

I watched him walk down the hall to the bedroom. He knocked twice on the door and went in. Standing there, holding my breath and listening to the murmurs, I felt like a secret, and their speaking did, too. My eyes wandered—on the lamp stand by the couch was a plate of taffy, and above it, a framed photo. I walked to it on tiptoes, but the glass over the picture was reflecting light from the lamp. Taking the frame in my hands, I wondered how many years it took to make the pale, faint square on the wall behind it. The picture, faded by light and time, was of a woman and a boy at the park, in the Conservatory of Flowers. The boy was blowing bubbles and the woman was midway through tucking her white hair behind her ear. Her hand was on his shoulder, his free arm was wrapped around her waist. It looked like she was about to say something to the person behind the camera, and the boy looked like he saw god in the bubbles above his nose. I heard Drew’s footsteps and saw him walk to the bathroom. He was holding a clear, plastic urinal, full of piss, and I listened as he emptied it into the toilet. At first, the flushing sounded like an awful chorus of choking, but then, like water rushing over cold stones. I took a piece of taffy, put the picture back on the wall. It hung crooked one way, then, the other, and I was still working on it with gentle hands when Drew came with his to set it right.