A Man Hid

By Stacey Levine

A middle-aged man hid from himself because he saw himself in a young boy. The experience stirred him. He willed his own boyishness to life. This was Jules.

But after he bent his head to the boy’s shoulder in the park, it went wrong. People were frightened and talked. Jules decided he must leave the town.

When you have to go away, life and its experiences become jagged.

In the new town called Fishguard, he hiked through a prism of greenness to a place called Hollis Hill. There: a softwood shack and layers of daffodils, a world within a world.

In his canvas shoes he circled the pond. Jules’ hurt mind traveled to his former house and the hanging air of his hometown. He hankered for the future. We seek the chapter’s end for the relief of it. Like the fruits of fireworks’ stars, stories cause us to think harder at the finish. And afterward — the hanging, sulfurous haze. Jules sought it.

The grass was stabbed with dew. Hollis Hill’s birch trees reedy and they leaned. No one around. The customs of our era do not change until years later. The pliancy of flowers’ flesh goes unrewarded.

The end is the start, the question mark.

Across the pond, Jules saw a man with a golden dog exploring.

Stacey Levine is the author of four works of fiction including The Girl with Brown Fur (Starcherone/Dzanc), Frances Johnson (Clear Cut Press), Dra—(Sun & Moon Press), and My Horse and Other Stories (Sun & Moon).