The Key to Everything (14 page)

When she looked at it the book, it moved. She knew it wasn’t. It couldn’t be. All the same, the old pages rose and fell in slow rhythm. Breathing. No. Not real. Could not be real. 

Climbing the stairs to leave, she gradually became aware of something pushing against her lower back. She scrambled up the steps two by two to get out of that dark space faster. The pressure gained strength. The hair on the back of her neck stood on end when she closed the door. Where was he? Her heart was racing, and she leaned on the door to keep from falling. She stood there and caught her breath, straightening the front of her blouse with sweaty palms.

Someone needed Abram for a job. That must be it. He went out while she and the girls were asleep is all. Yes. He would be back any time now. 

Dedra snapped her head in a stiff nod to reassure herself of the truth. She called out to the girls to come inside and get cleaned up. Then she placed a pot of water on the stove to boil. If she was going to make those sandwiches, she needed some hardboiled eggs.

-23-

The Tattooist

Tied together in a tightly knit group, the small needles moved up and down in a blur. Each time the sharpened bundle went down, it pushed its way through the first layer of skin, leaving a dot of black ink that would remain etched into the dermis forever. The artist moved his hand deftly around the outline of the design. In several decades of marking people’s flesh, this was a first for him. It wasn’t the usual tribal pattern or Celtic knot. He was relieved he didn’t have to spend an hour working on some drunken sorority chick that wanted an arrow pointing down below her belly button. It wasn’t his concern if she considered it a mistake in the cruel light of morning.

This man didn’t look like a typical customer. More people were getting tattoos than ever before, which was good for business, of course. He inked doctors and lawyers right alongside athletes and musicians. He even did a life-sized gavel on a circuit court judge’s inner thigh. Not his most pleasant evening, but the old guy tipped well. Still, this particular man was unexpected. Most middle-aged men came in for their mid-life crisis tattoos trying to impress their new twenty-years-too-young, post-divorce squeezes. They always wanted lightning bolts on their loose-skinned biceps or maybe a cherry red Stratocaster with the words, “Rockin’ On.” They’d always put it somewhere that could be hidden beneath their shirt or even covered by a sport sock when they played racquetball with their boss. 

This particular man came in alone, thick, dark bags under his eyes and covered from head to toe in a strange white-tannish dust. Puffs and clouds of the stuff flew off his body every time he moved, glimmering in the shafts of sun coming down from the skylight. He removed the crumpled piece of brown paper from his shirt pocket and hesitantly slid it across the counter, his head down, making no attempt at eye contact.

Without words, the dusty man touched the black drawing with his right index finger, rolled up the sleeve on his left arm, flipped his hand over, closing his hand into a loose fist, and pressed his fingertip into the flesh directly below the second wrinkle underneath the hand. He held it there for a long time. None of the other guys were in the shop this early, so the place was empty. Silence hummed in spirals on the verge of becoming uncomfortable.

Looking at the size of the drawing and where the man wanted it done, the artist did some quick calculations in his head. The complex drawing filled with minute details would be difficult. It would take more than a few hours to do this thing right. The artist said it would be about four hundred bucks. The dusty man looked him in the eye for the first time and nodded. He pulled a battered leather wallet from his front pants pocket, opened it and placed six crisp, brand-new hundred-dollar bills in the artist’s hand.

* * *

Five hours later, the artist walked outside the front door and stretched his aching muscles. Silently he lit his cigarette and stared out past the arrhythmic pattern of cars driving by on Route 6. There was no story behind the design. None was needed. There were no names exchanged, nor any other conversation for that matter. The artist could tell the man was kind-spirited by his mannerisms. He sat in the chair, calm and quiet. When the needle pierced his skin for the first time, he showed no telltale flinch of a newbie getting his first tattoo. The man’s breathing was slow and steady, never faltering. 

The artist was proud of his work. Always proud to some degree, but this piece was different. It moved him. After his cigarette burned down to the filter, the artist realized he had forgotten to take a picture of the tattoo for his book. He would have framed and placed this one in a sacred spot on his wall in the shop. Thinking about the tattoo, the artist felt moistness on his cheeks. He never cried. He flicked the brown-stained nub of the cigarette to the ground and stubbed it out with the heel of his All-Star high top. 

The artist couldn’t remember the last time he cried like this. He laughed when his dad died, the son of a bitch. Walking inside, he closed the shop door and locked it behind him. His talented fingers gently traced across the glass countertop, over the piercing studs and stickers emblazoned with the shop logo. Sobbing broke through like a tidal wave, and the artist allowed himself to drown in it. This was a good sadness, a cleansing sorrow.

The artist smeared the snot from his nose onto his color-infused forearm and sat down in his work chair. When the seas finally calmed, he smiled with an unfamiliar sense of relief. He liked it. Cleaning up his supplies, he placed the used needles into the sharps disposal safe and collected the unused ink. He peeled the tape off the table and gathered up all the papers that protected from spilled ink or blood and threw them away. After setting up the workspace for his next appointment, he noticed something sitting in the center of the chair. The old man didn’t leave this here by accident. It was a gift. He left the sculpture to be found long after the man left the shop. 

The artist hung the beautiful brass key on a nail directly above his mirror. Its fine teeth came down over the frame by an inch or two, but that didn’t bother him at all. He went into the back room and, after shuffling through the boxes and crates of unused crap for a few minutes, found what he was looking for. The shabby-chic white frame stood out from other artwork on the walls. Unlike the other objects that were intended to shock and offend people, this particular item was clean. Pure.

The artist stood back and smiled. He read the words, and a lightness entered into his heart that he didn’t think existed before. He read the words over and over again. Lost in a pleasant moment of clarity and happiness that might have lasted all day if he were left to his own devices, he was awoken from his dreaming by a knock on the door. The artist read the words one last time and then turned to unlock the door and get started on his next tattoo. 

Over the years, the artist never saw anyone else pay attention to it hanging there. But he looked at the note and the key at least once a day. He read the words, and they never failed in helping him to feel at peace: “For your dreams.”

-24-

Dedra: Labyrinth

Dedra heard the girls squeal when Daddy came through the front door. She wanted to scream at him. She wanted to throw the plates in her hands at his head. Instead, with delicate precision, she put both plates exactly in the center of each setting. The placemats rested parallel with the edges of the square table. The sandwiches rested already sliced in quarters on the serving tray in the middle of the table. 

She stood behind her chair in front of the sink, with her hands loosely draped over the back. Abram walked in from the hallway. Looking like an ashamed little boy, he bowed his head and stared down at the floor for a moment, then moved toward the sink followed by a puff of strange powder. She coughed. It left a thick, musty smell of old paper in the air. Dedra pulled out her chair and sat down, listening to the water clean her husband’s hands.

His lips were gentle when they pressed against the top of her head. She reached up, and they interlaced fingers just above her shoulders. His breath rustled the hair behind her ears in an old, familiar way that she had missed for a very long time. Abram squeezed her hands, removed his lips from her head, and took his seat beside her at the table.

Dedra didn’t mention the bandage on his forearm at first. In the time it took her to take just three bites of her sandwich, Abram ate one entire sandwich and started in on the next. He smiled at her and thanked her for making lunch. He apologized for being gone so long and asked that she not make any further inquiries into his whereabouts. 

She bristled at this last request, somewhat offended, and didn’t understand why he wouldn’t tell her. He asked for her patience and told her that he would show her as soon as he could. She was willing to wait a little while, but not for too long. 

Abram noticed her eyes flickering down to his bandaged wrist. He took a butter knife from the table, cut through the plastic tape, and pulled the bandage away. 

It looked so real. Dedra took his fingers and placed his left hand flat on the table. The detail was exquisite. The tattoo was entirely black, yet there were patterns that weaved in between other lines creating mazes and puzzles in all three dimensions. The longer she looked at it, the more detail she could make out. What was locked inside this?

He lifted her face by her chin and kissed her softly on the lips. Taking her head in his hands he pressed their two foreheads together and whispered, “Everything.”

PART THREE

Paper

A book paper (or publishing paper) is a paper designed specifically for the publication of printed books. Traditionally, book papers are off-white or low-white papers (easier to read), are opaque to minimize the show-through of text from one side of the page to the other and are (usually) made to tighter thickness specifications, particularly for case-bound books. Typically, book papers are lightweight and often specified by their caliper/substance ratios (volume basis). Volume basis allows the calculation of a book's printed pages per inch which is an important factor for the design of book jackets and the binding of the finished book. Different paper qualities are used as book paper depending on type of book. Machine-finished coated papers, wood-free uncoated papers, infinitely amorphous papers, coated fine papers and special fine papers are common paper grades.

Key

[kee] noun, plural keys, adjective, verb, keyed, key·ing.

1.a small metal instrument specially cut to fit into a lock and move its bolt thus allowing access to an item or hidden space. 2.something that affords a means of access. 3.something that secures or controls entrance to a place 4.a book, pamphlet, or other text containing the solutions or translations of material given elsewhere. 5.a pin, bolt, wedge, or other piece inserted in a hole or space to lock or hold parts of a mechanism or structure together; 6.a contrivance for grasping and turning a bolt, nut, spiritual authority, etc.

Lock

[lok]–noun

1.a device for securing a door, gate, lid, drawer, or the like in position when closed, consisting of a bolt or system of bolts propelled and withdrawn by a mechanism operated by a key, dial, etc. 2.a contrivance for fastening or securing something or someplace. 3.any device or part for stopping temporarily the motion of a mechanism. 4.complete and unchallenged control; an unbreakable hold

[lok]–verb (used with object)

1.to fasten or secure (a door, window, building, etc.) by the operation of a lock or locks.2.to shut in a place
fastened by a lockor locks, as for security or restraint. 3. to join or unite firmly by interlinking or intertwining

[lok]–verb (used without object)

1.to become locked: This door locks with a key. 2.to keep apart 3. to become fastened, fixed, or interlocked: gears that lock into place.

- Wikipedia

-25-

Dedra: Waiting

The skin beneath her wedding band turned red and raw. Dedra couldn’t stop herself from twisting it around and around on her finger. It started to become painful by the seventh day, and yet the compulsion would not go away. Dishes piled up in the sink to the point where flies were buzzing around the kitchen. If she had bothered to lift a saucer, she would have found an unwashed plate of weeks-old scrambled eggs underneath, swarmed with squirming maggots recoiling from the light.

Jesse and Maria remained locked away upstairs in their room. If they were eating, Dedra didn’t notice. What food remained in the refrigerator was spoiled, and the entire house was permeated with a foul cloud. Windows were lifted open, and fans tried unsuccessfully with all of their spinning plastic might to circulate the stale air outside.

Dedra sat immobile in the kitchen. Unblinking eyes stared blankly through the window above the sink at the squirrel staring right back at her from the top of the fence. She twisted the ring around and around, digging a groove into her finger’s soft skin, the squirrel’s hands mirroring her vacant motions.

Abram went down to the basement seven weeks ago. She watched him walk down the stairs into the darkness. The door was left open, and Dedra fought a powerful urge to close it, to straighten out the angles in the hallway. She didn’t close it. Instead, she moved silently down the first steps to see what Abram was doing. He always left through the basement and never came back. This time she needed to see his secret escape route, and nothing he said would stop her.