good motherly hands crowded by jewelry; graceful well-defined fingers, solid movements. could crafts things or manipulate things. high knuckles like spinal column, oval fingernails, as though shaped and buffed. no colored polish, but luminous/pearlescent. thin gold-colored chain bracelets, she shows them off – ‘from the thrift store, 25 cents a piece. aren’t they beautiful?’ – she wants to know. always at the thrift, see her there sometimes. demands a hug, me holding breath against her cloud of perfume / piss. blue eyes are pale, on the small side, but fierce – pieces of rock candy set into her head. slightly magnified by glasses – outdated, appropriate, pinkish clear frames, whimsical shape, comparitively large. dry ragged witch’s hair always smashed by hat – one hat or another, owns many of them and always changing, a constant rotation.

today’s hat is white, square, furry, as in Russia. folds up at bottom, looks like mad hatter, cartoon character. big glasses in action, lipstick ultra-bright as usual, pearl drop earrings, orange clothes all over and then a coat, a white one, with collar pointed straight up and out, cradling her neck. big plastic buttons and square pockets, could’ve been a lab coat. brilliant fashion statement, i feel mesmerized.

listen to her talk openly of bowel movements – how many, how painful, how relieving. watch her bustle around kitchen, finding things to eat. isn’t satisfied with choices, complains loudly. blames everything on everyone. waddles from one cabinet to the next, looks like a pregnant woman, one who’s been pregnant before. belly swollen and looking hard, full of something. proud of it, shoulders rolled back, hands and arms limp but always ready, like an ape’s. feet shuffle a bit, constant weight shifting, like nervous child. commands discussions, eyes go milky when forced to listen, lips recede and bloom, recede and bloom. waiting.

watch her expertly handle medications, expert at something. picks up bottles with 2 fingers and flicks labels toward her, looks at them over glasses, sets them down or opens them. unscrews a cap in agile burst, shakes perfect number into cup, swallows without water. sits most casually, one foot under rump, as though teenaged. pays no attention to others, but talks, talks. passes judgements, throws insults, asks questions with no rest for answers. gossips about girl in other room who’s pregnant, lets the whole world know. is angered when told the girl will have abortion – doesn’t believe in this, lets the whole world know. faces away from room as she talks – disrespectful. back of head is comical – only slight, bird-like movements – gentle snapping, subdued lolling, thoughtful side-turning to examine bottles and pages. ugly words stream from other, unseen side – harsh, inconsiderate, assuming. bitchy. back of head is cheerful, brisk, light-hearted. carefree. words are cutting, damaging, careless.

pregnant girl comes clomping down hallway. gait very awkward, like puppet or soldier. jerky, knees rise too much, shoulders shift side-to-side. looks like man, short hair, ruddy face, leather coat. pulls chair out gruffly from dining table – loud calamitous sound, wood on wood. sits down hard and heavy. headphones around neck, turned on, audible. radio static. sits and stares across room, at wall, looking up. maybe at ceiling, hard to tell. right hand on table flat – tense, dirty, nicotine-stained. left hand on bouncing knee. mouth pursed and pale. eyes lazy. big boots and black jeans. name’s amy, doesn’t fit. can’t be a woman; is. breasts evident, grey t-shirt can’t hide them. emblem on left side, beer company. likely free from somewhere.

tv on in corner with others watching – 3 of them on big soft couch, steady staring. big older woman in stiff regal armchair, irritated by CH. tells her loudly to ‘can it’ – i laugh. big old lady doesn’t smile; seems angry for real. no humor there. is bitter about missing end of show.

CH moves to dining table to eat – 2 plates, a bowl, 5 cups – 3 juice, a milk, a water. on plates are pudding, salad, meat, everything. bread. eats with patience but gets it on face. chomps slow and noisy while looking at nothing. thinking what? not a word, all drained out already.

always sits in same spot, round table in corner by window, same seat i’d choose if i lived there; most cozy. elbows on table, forearms too, spread wide and flattened. gold chains at wrist drape and clatter against wood. removes hat, big bald head. perfectly shaped, would love to see her skull. ears also perfect, seem youthful, somehow – pliant, freckled. two seashells. hair fans out from temples, around to back of head, looks like clown. napkin laid flat off to side, messy lipstick blot. smeared more on face. seems very thoughtful, morose. consumed by separate concerns, unaware of surroundings, people in room no longer existing. looks out window, though nighttime – nothing but fluorescent tube reflection. finishes all food, some drink, cleans up. doesn’t wipe table, doesn’t push in chair. walks down hall with no more words – goes upstairs. door to bedroom heard closing – sad on bed? crying? can’t be sure, but do wonder.

others are glad for her absence, express annoyance. for me best not to respond.

go into office, other worker there, haven’t heard from him all night. too busy. interesting black man, soft-spoken but frantic in movement. long strong Dinka legs in olive slacks, loafers without sock, jazzy silky shirt. ringed hands, beetle fingernails, my favorite. roundish head with tiny curls of white sprouting, smashed nose, yellowed eye-whites, rest as dark as oil spills (wisdom). friendly to me, leans back in chair and one ankle on other knee and hands folded at head-crown. first chat for us, goes easily. CH is mentioned – he complains, i hold tongue.

she appears, looms over dutch door bottom, arms rest solid on it, gets comfortable. prattles on, killing time, claims ready for bed but doesn’t retreat, looks dimly pleading behind stoic mask. goes away reluctant but quick turns back – more to add. on and on, 5, 6 times like this. same speech, mixed around. saying nothing. wants company, wants audience, is pushed away by black man. ends each bout so matter-of-fact, so definitive, so certain – think she must be done, will finally go. her back turns and we continue office chat with amused grins, but then she’s back again. how very lonely she is.

vermruka

here at work things are the same. people in need, crawling all over the place – up the walls, outta their skin. old man (84) at my feet on a plastic bed. all bundled up like a newborn babe. pillow’s twisted and bunched and pushed right up against the frame, top of his head firm into that. looks painful and uncompromising but what do i know? probably having the sleep of his lifetime, the dream of the century. last night he was strapped to the bed in the rubber room & he couldn’t help but urinate all over himself. what choice did he have. after they moved him out they sent me back to gather the restraints for washing; the stench was terrible. full of salt. it was like a barnyard back there, like a cow had given birth. the leather straps dripped when i picked them up, cold in my gloveless hands.

 we drove away and down Washington Avenue in philadelphia, between 11th and 8th streets, right around where we used to live.  i looked back and saw that blonde boy was trailing us, on foot, running with inhuman speed.  teenage afro-american boy, tall and slinky, kept up on a bike. both had guns, very large. caught up to us, cornered us, somehow. me ducking down in cab of the truck, curled up on floor. very frightened, the fright felt so real.  Z said something about how “no one ever really shoots anyone anymore,” (as though it was a dead fad) but i wasn’t reassured.  when blonde and his gun barrel confronted me i tried reasoning w/ him, talking to him. apologized for my comment, explained it as a side-effect of my depressing job. “do you know where i work?” i asked him. when i told him he softened, revealed that he’d actually spent some time there. we began to talk soothingly, understandingly.  as we did i looked down and noticed a small, thick tail growing out of the heel of my right foot. i kept playing with it, horrified by it, wanting to cut it off. it was so squat; squishy but hard, a tiny uncircumcised penis.

 later i was on the phone with dorit chrysler. i was standing in some sort of lobby or entranceway and i knew her to be out in the parking lot, sitting in a low, broken car & wearing a metallic green party dress.  on my way into this building i’d seen her out there & greeted her. on the phone she talked of a man she knew – a Japanese man who was “so beautiful & so honest”. she told me, “when you’re around him  you can SMELL the honesty on him.” she went on to add, “but the last time i saw him he immediately got out a huge CHAINSAW and started throwing around all these WIGS, and i was like, ‘what the fuck?’” — and then she started laughing, and i found myself delighted by her apparent fondness of the memory.

remember when life was so easy as trick-or-treating? and eating the candy and not brushing teeth? and being warm in your family’s living room? the child’s illusion of existence. things would always be that way, wouldn’t they?

don’t forget all of the birds dancing in the bush; an intricate geometric, just for you. they played musical branches because they saw you coming.
and the squirrels, too – there they were, ribboning all over the sidewalk, tiny bodies undulating in perfect S-shaped strides, then up the trees they went.

and don’t forget the retards, the retards. as i went gliding up the hill they came trailing down, right in front of me, just across the street. they all stopped obediently come curb-time and the black woman authority herded ‘em all with her quick, all-knowing glance, counting their silly heads like nothing. one of them stared at me big-time, from the corner of his eye. he had on a little backpack and some headphones wrapped ’round his neck. his face was stubbled and made him look like any old guy, a sleaze too busy for upkeep. his eyes had a bit of the sleaze, his hands grabbed the straps of his bag tight. i noticed that i was doing the same. the whole pack of them rustled in place like pigeons who’ve already eaten, already found all the scraps, don’t know what to do next. one of them lagged behind, he looked older than the others, and more tired. like he had something on his mind. half of his face shielded by an oversized hat, but he threw back his head a bit to get a look. his eyes were cavernous, full of his past. he was dressed in all blues, too bright for his mood. hands were ruddy, could’ve been a serious thinker, a gambling man, a wife-beater. could’ve driven a pickup truck, could’ve cracked open a cold one. could’ve thrown away his dinner, only one bite eaten. could’ve tied a rope around someone else’s throat. could’ve been an expert card shuffler, could’ve laughed loudly with his friends, could’ve been the sort to sigh and grumble whenever the phone would ring – could’ve been anything, if it weren’t for that lip, that dumb, flat lip. one look at it all stretched-out under the shadow from his hat and he was reduced to a one-word answer.

and another — long wavy hippie hair, roundish glasses magnifying roundish owl eyes, never-blinking. teeth rotting out left and right, zebra-striped and mossy. he waved at me in big chimpanzee arm flings and shouted – HELLO! – and then a high-pitched giggle. got out back and saw that the [delightful, sexy] host was preparing thin strips of beef & fresh-cut vegetables for our delicious meal. i watched this process awhile, took a fully-loaded bowl of marijuana when it was offered and smoked it. instant perspective shift.

the birthday girl’s mother and father were in attendance and had planted themselves directly in front of where i was sitting. dad was posing stiffly in a metal chair where he told loud, bad, ill-timed jokes and munched messily on grimy foods. his lovely daughter had to take care of everything, arranging a plate for him that could have arranged itself, it was so easy. he ended up with guacamole all over his face and fingers and his terrible wife had to come along and smear it off. her wide, flat ass was in my face all night, her cigarette smoke. muddy brown pancake up-make, teenage magenta lips. tarantula eyes batting at no one, at anyone who would look. and why were her teeth so white? why was she stuck with this crippled cripple who couldn’t even muster the energy to die? he was so ready, every bristly hair on his single, flaking leg was crying out for it.

i found the lady of honor in the kitchen, cooing over the stovetop with five other women squeezed all around her; two pregnant bellies demanded attention, long wooden spoons were stirring, stirring. laughter flowed, fragrant hair tumbled and twisted and ended. cheeks bloomed their rosy reds, moist tongues rolled in conversation and then the birthday girl was hugging me; introductions all around. i must have been in there 30 seconds and already i was drunk; i was drunk on women. so many breasts so close to one another, but respectful; hiding from each other, just flirting, just playing. i wanted to join in, to let the steam rise from the burners and lick my face, too. i wanted to understand their stories, i wanted us to create a new one. i wanted to call them on the phone that night, afterward, and talk about what a good time we’d had; make plans for the next one. i wanted to hug them all of the time, whenever i felt i should. their speech was so easy; it had never been so easy for me and i wasn’t so sure that it could.

i left them then, slipping from the din, and re-joined the boys on the porch – their denim vibe and their dirty sock dreams and their roaming eyes. they tilted their glass bottles and mumbled into the slurry. they wiped their fat lips with the backs of their fat hands and they stared at me, stared at me, and i knew right then – sick as it made me – i was home again.

“well, whatd you expect?”

“oh, i dunno,” he said, peering between the blinds, pulling them down and releasing them with a short snap. “part of me almost saw us getting married.”

i laughed. he suddenly walked to the other end of the room.

“i gotta go, ill be right back,” he said. “weve been talking awhile.”

i waited silently while he hurried out. i tried to imagine him 20 years younger and found that it wasnt difficult.

he came back with a sheet of music and an instrument id never seen before, something small. he arranged the paper on a music stand that had been off to the side the whole time and then sat back down in his chair.

“it really isnt important what you do with that money,” he said, wetting the top of the instrument with his tongue. “id just pretend you never found it. nothing you could buy would mean anything.”

“what about traveling?” i said, surprised.

“every place is the same.”

but i knew it wasnt true. i immediately saw a map of the earth, each region illuminated for a moment; enlarged. the people, eating their different foods, speaking their languages. “thats ridiculous,” i said.

but he wasnt paying attention to me. he was tapping his foot, counting quietly, 1 2 3 4, and then he began to play.

i heard he has a superiority complex and now it’s all i can think about. i look at him through the eyes of my own superiority complex, judging his hands and his legs and his sweatpants hiked to the hilt with his meager penis swinging. and he has breasts, too, they jiggle a little when he walks. they bounce when he arcs the pool cue back and forth over the table.

he lines up with everyone else for dinner, puts in his order and then holds his tray a mile out in front of him while he scans the room for a seat. he forgets his milk and goes back for it, spilling it on one of the other patients when he wheels around in a hurry to get back to his meal. neither of them say a word or move a muscle for a good five seconds, then michael bursts into laughter. ‘oh my god,’ is all he says. ‘oh my god.’ the other patient, a woman, stands there furiously but still doesn’t move, just stares at her enormous bosom and the fresh, wet spotting there. her giant purple-tinted eyeglasses seem to darken as her anger mounts; she sets her own tray, which is piled high with grease and starch, on the counter and then walks off to her room without eating.

michael ignores the little puddle of milk he’s left on the floor and returns to his tray happily. he holds a single slice of bread with both hands, as one might hold a sandwich, and eats it like one might eat a sandwich; careful, well-timed bites. his feet straddle the wide column that supports the table he’s sitting at; he’s wearing dingy white socks that we’ve provided him and one big toenail cuts right through; a hideous and blackened toenail that’s comical in its length and sharpness. it just sits there while he eats, sticks straight up into the air and doesn’t go anywhere. it has such character; it reminds me of the sort of old, sparse-tooth’d man you might see out in a bar somewhere; makes me think of that kind of jagged smile. makes me think of mummies that i’ve seen, and their toenails, their smiles.

when he finishes he passes me on the way to the trashcan and says something to me and i see that he has food in his teeth. ‘what was that?’ i ask him, even though i heard him perfectly well; i just want to see the bit of food again. he repeats himself and there it is; the translucent green skin of a single pea wrapped neatly around one of his canines like a birthday present. i can’t believe it. i lick my own tooth in pure delight.

But she was alive. I saw her eyes roll exaggerated as we struggled to position her on the plastic seat awaiting in the water. Her cheeks puffed with effort as she decided to make an appearance, to be present for the occasion. ‘You fools,’ she must have been thinking, licking at the hairs that cris-crossed her lip; the even, black hairs. Her arms gripped the sides of the tub with such strength; made me think of square-torsoed German women rolling dough, wringing laundry.

Her lower half into the water like a boulder sinking. Her back sloping away from the rest of her body and ending in a small, firm, unattractive ass. The dark and moist-looking crack of the ass gave birth to a long scar that snaked crudely along the spine before it disappeared between her shoulder blades.

“I’ll need some things from the closet,” she said. She was tired, bored of us. I peeled the latex gloves from my hands and held them, balled, at my sides. I stood there and waited for her to tell me what she needed.

“There’s a bar of soap that I brought. I don’t like your soap, it dries me out,” she said, her tongue thick in her mouth. “And two bottles of lotion, but I only want you to bring me the pink one. No, wait. Bring me the other one. The yellow.”

Bring me. I asked if there was anything else.

“Clothes, get me some clothes.” And she laughed, remembering clothes. I noticed her nipples; decent in size, shape, color. Both ringed in stray hairs an inch long. Her breasts were large and upthrust and firm, her swollen belly giving gentle rise between them and folding them quietly away from each other. She was very unashamed of her body, almost unaware, and I thought of her always being in these situations, how many times her flesh must have been open to review.

I left and walked the small hallway to the bedroom, seeing the black scuffs along the walls and on the floor, from shoes and tires, as we’d tried to maneuver her nude and deformed body into the bathroom. Such a production; what should have been an embarrassment for her and not us.

I heard her calling the names of more things for me to bring as I opened the closet next to her bed.

“And I’ll need a razor,” she said loudly, then changed her mind: “I’ll need two.”

I heard low murmuring, what I knew to be my colleague asking what she wanted with the razors; why two of them, would she be safe with them?

“Of course I’ll be safe,” she snapped; her terrible high-pitched voice. I heard her say she wanted to shave everything, to feel pretty. I re-entered the bathroom with handfuls of her items and saw her rubbing at her legs sexually, eyelids lowering, dark lashes on her face like trembling spiders.

And we stood there and we watched her.

Her eyes remained closed for most of the procedure. (It was a procedure.)

She started by squirting shampoo from a travel-sized bottle into her palm and mashing it into her hair. She kept one hand patiently on her knee and used the other to work the shampoo around her head, into the hair that was cut like a boy’s; indistinct; the perfect and familiar swirl at the crown where the hair’s pattern was set into motion. I found that concentrating on this absence of hair, this eye of the storm, endeared me to her.

“Rinse,” she said, grasping the air like an infant. “Time to rinse.” (Now a mother to her infant.)

Quickly I retrieved a Dixie cup from the dispenser on the wall (she had the big bathroom with all the trimmings) and tried to hand it to her but her eyes were still squeezed shut and she didn’t see me. Smiling at the woman helping me, a middle-aged woman with the large and needy eyes of a koala bear, I dipped the cup into the bathwater and dumped it flatly onto the girl’s cake-frosted hair, stiff white peaks dissolving and smoothing out into dark streaks that squirmed against her neck like leeches.

In surprise she’d thinned her lips to nonexistence and now they sprung open quick, like a mousetrap in reverse: “Cold! It’s so cold!”

I stared at her dumbly, at her bloated legs sitting useless in the water, wondering why she hadn’t complained the moment we’d put her in. Wondering if her legs had any feeling in them at all.

She was saying that we needed to start over. That she wanted out, and could I bring the robe from her closet? And she’d wait in the chair while we made her a new bath, with hot water this time.

Without hesitation we lifted her from the plastic perch, its rubberized feet slipping with the force of all of us pulling and shifting around, and when she was almost out, her own feet caught on the back of the chair and we had no choice but to let it topple over, let it slap flat against the water and then slowly sink down.

I’d already grabbed her robe on my first trip to the closet and now I wrestled with her to get it onto her wet body. She shoved her arms through the thin nylon sleeves with a grunt while koala-eyes made sure her wheelchair was steady; we eased her gently back into it and she took a moment to adjust, make herself comfortable, find a good position. I thought of her body parts sliding around on the fabric seat, her body parts that hadn’t been washed yet; that were still dirty.

Once in the chair proper she rolled herself away, her big arms winding in graceful flourishes. I watched as she coasted easily out the door. As she passed I looked at the way the fatness of her neck made the short, boyish hairs push out and spread, exposing the skin there. Droplets of water streamed down her back.

Then she disappeared around the corner, but before she had gone, I caught her smiling. Her face, in profile, had become sinister; the eyebrow arched in such a way that I’d never imagined it doing before; her jaw was now squarely set, teeth pressed in determination, and she was smiling. There wasn’t any helplessness left in her features, it had vanished with one great push of those wheels.

The koala was picking up discarded towels and hadn’t noticed anything, so after a pause I followed the girl out there, into her bedroom. I went over in my head what I might say to her: “What’s the big idea?” came to mind, causing me to unexpectedly laugh; such a ridiculous phrase. The laugh was low in volume and breathy but she caught it anyway and turned her head to look at me; I spontaneously used the laughter as a friendly segue into my confrontation: “What do you think you’re doing?” I said as I grinned; dropped my head a little to the side like a teacher who’s asked you to meet with them after class.

Her body remained completely out of my vision; just a large spotted head rose from the back of the chair like a puppet show about to start. She stared at me relentless, face frozen like a picture of her and not a real her. In that moment I thought she looked sadly beautiful – again, a stance I hadn’t anticipated taking – but I liked her lips that were pale and poised and full, an effortless blending to the rest of her skin. The whiskers curled away independent, a dozen broken piano strings.

I walked to her, waving my hand in a friendly, forgiving gesture, wondering whether I should actually say ‘I’m sorry’ or just assume that it was understood, and then I saw what she was in the middle of doing. I was standing directly behind the chair now, looking past the endearing swirl and down into her lap. Her left wrist was drawn over the jungle of her pubic hair, elbow tight at her waist. The other hand was pinching the small blade from one of the razors she’d asked for, the ones we’d given to her, it winked at me so shiny. Its pink plastic cartridge rested serenely on her mottled thigh. The strangest part was the movement of the blood; rolling from the wound in milky somersaults, churning out of her body. I took in the scene for what seemed like a very long time, unsure of what to do about what I was seeing, pretending I wasn’t seeing it. Everything in the room was very clear, suddenly – everything edges. The late afternoon sunlight on the white floor; a kind of light I’d found depressing for as long as I could remember. Her closet door standing open from when I’d rooted around for her things; six pairs of brand-new underwear waiting patiently and neatly in the corner of one of the shelves, two piles of three. Her bra still unfolded and laying flat from when I’d looked at it; when I’d held it in my hands and thought of her wearing it. I’d rubbed the material between my fingertips, looked at the tag: 34C, larger than mine. I’d looked at this bra and the other things in her closet – the cheap cotton panties, the tampons – and felt close to her. Understanding of her because she was a woman; deeply and quietly linked to her by this one thing that we shared.

*ending removed fer now ’cause i’m workin’ on it!*

“Hi!” I echoed, ducking my head in shyness or nervousness and then advancing toward him, readying myself for his breath near me and in my nose while he kissed my face. I held my own breath and expelled silently as he released me, had his look at me. He threw one arm across my shoulders, me one step below him so my shins banged against the wood and I almost lost my balance. He was a little cold, his hands against my warm arm, and the sweat shone on his chin. I felt sick to my stomach. What if all he wanted to do up there was try to invade me with his fragile body, what if he’d ignore all words from my lips and go straight for the waist, wrapping his bruised arms around it tightly, tenderly? I wondered how I might react to things like that – how I planned to react.

Second floor, at the end of a long and wooden hallway, was a door; the last door before we’d get to where he lived and slept. The light was dim when we reached the door but I noticed right away – it’d been painted. Not a solid, certain color, like it was when I’d last seen it – when it was a brooding kind of dark red – no, now it was fabulously decorated; festooned in a maze of elegant body parts; arms over legs, faces between legs, faces beside faces; what seemed like thousands of people piled atop one another in a landfill of living flesh; sexually charged yet subdued as the ocean; interlocking perfectly like an important and massive jigsaw puzzle. over my shoulder he giggled at me, a giggle that i knew and, for the past thirteen-fourteen months, had only heard through a phone. here in the hallway it was injected with a remarkable, youthful glee; through the receiver it had been broken and dry, a sinister laugh from a much older throat. in the hallway he rested his hand faint on my head and asked, “you like that?” his voice was like powder, small clouds burst softly from his mouth. “’s good, ain’t it?”

i pressed a hand on top of his small hand and then lifted it from my hair, spinning myself to face him straight. i hugged him hard, digging my chin into the nest of his collarbone, and i felt i might cry. it occurred to me that i wasn’t sure why i would cry, that i wasn’t sure how i felt in that moment; that i felt nothing, maybe. i planted my chin further down into the meat of his shoulder and stared past the puff of his tucked-in shirt from his pants-waist, the cheap black belt that cinched it; the cheap black shoes. i stared at the floor and saw that it was riddled with color; the dirty brown boards were coming alive with deep blues just barely detectable in the poor light; but also the pinks which gleamed like strips of skin at our feet. white, mint green and orange, confettied around us.  i saw him standing there several afternoons, choosing the mid-day time slot for the quiet of others being gone; but also for the sun through the far window, which would slant ideally at him and his canvas of the moment. i saw him with his tongue flicking out from his (new) teeth with a barely detectable sound like oil heating and popping in a pan, i saw him with his weathered old hat pushed back from his hairless head, the once-satiny bow now creaking with age and dust. and i thought i felt love for him, then, in the hallway; a swelling kind of love that starts in the brain and ends in the chest – an intellectual love. quickly i released him from my grip and got one good, long look at him, right into his wide-open eyes; no lashes; and we shared that same silly old stare. magic hadn’t gone away, it was just different, somehow. there was more clarity, i was older now. i opened the painted door to reveal the stairs there and he just looked at me; i watched him taking a pencil from his breast pocket and wetting it, getting it ready. i let him climb ahead of me this time, waving my hand to let him pass. “i’m only your guest,” i said, and at this he grinned, walking backward for a moment and starting to laugh, a low and gradual rumble like a train approaching. he lingered for a moment, smile still huge as when it appeared, then tucked the pencil behind his ear and turned, bounded up the stairs.