Kirk Glaser

Slapping oil on the decks, head throbbing from the stench and heat, the beers he’d been drinking since noon, Gabe dropped the brush and glared at the bay glimmering under late sun.

No more nights sleeping on the deck, Gabe-Gabe. They come back tomorrow. No more watching the stars, a sky full of embers just for you. He tried to ignore the voice, a new one when he started working here, that creaked a leather arm around his shoulders, held tight, and rasped through cinder-dry lips in his ear.

No more visions, Indians standing on the rock outcrop pointing to a three-master glowing on the water, his chin pushed up to look, calling to you, Gabe-Gabe, asking for your help. You belong here, they said so, not those fuckers who call it their home.

He piled cans and oily rags on a tarp and tamped down lids to still the voice. Time to go. No more good life when they return. No longer his, the vaulted ceilings, the windows facing the bay, the antiques and piano, the paintings and clothes and big TV.

All they inherited, and what did you get, Gabe-Gabe? Your mother’s money, some bastard’s who killed her, spent on the fucker’s lawyers, mouth crackling in his ear. Murdered, and you couldn’t prove a thing. Your mother’s life, you fucking failed. Even the money they pay you, Gabe-Gabe, not yours—two months rent, the meth to keep you going grunt grunt. You owe it all. None of it is yours.

He smacked his brush against a bench, oil splattering in sunlight. There’s cash stashed somewhere, Gabe-Gabe, and jewelry, too. Break a window; they’ll think they were robbed. Take it; they’ll never know.

He was searching the bedroom when a car nosed down the road. Bitch they have been watching the place. Why didn’t they trust you, Gabe-Gabe? He ran outside and grabbed a brush. She found him under the deck, oiling a post, muttering. Her eyes narrow. “What are you doing here?” She looked around. “Is there someone else?”

Bitch. Tell her they told you to oil the decks. “Nobody, just me; they called and asked me to finish up before they came home.” She stared at him. Grab her; no one will know. Leathery hand rubbing his crotch. He swatted it away and kept his other painting the post, delicate as stroking a woman’s leg. “It’s late, you should go.” Fear in her eyes. Bitch, knock her down, take her. “Just finishing.” She closed the door; he heard it lock.

When she left, he kicked it in, hunted the house, dumped drawers, pulled boxes and clothes from closets, flipped mattresses, swore. No cash. A cigarette he dropped smoldered on the floor, a foot crushing it into the wood. Thought they were so generous when your truck broke down, feeding you dinner, taking you home. Poor Gabe-Gabe needs handouts. Fuck them, fuck this house.

He grabbed a jewelry box and staggered down the hall, slamming walls. Opened another beer, lit a joint, sat at the kitchen counter. All over the floor, the crap he spilled, broken plates, furniture knocked over. You’ll never make it look right. They’ll know it was you, Gabe-Gabe. Better make sure they never do. You know how you’ve known all along what it was coming to?

Hand lighting a cigarette, another pushing him to the garage. Eyes glassy and twitching like after a night of booze and speed, fingers trembling over the gas can. Five gallons, that fucker so prepared. Cleared the field on his shiny new mower to keep fire from their new home. Needed you on back, though, when wheels spun. Should have let you mow; you could’ve jockeyed it all alone. You could have jockeyed her, Gabe-Gabe, when he wasn’t there. But you blew it, coward, like always, fear juicing your bone.

Can splash on the rugs wrapped up in the garage and boxes still unpacked. Lugged through the house, spilling gas on floors, walls, and the mess he’d made, slowing to pool it on his desk, her dresser, and their bed.

More oil in the garage, Gabe-Gabe. Two weeks slapping these decks for them in the hot sun while they’re off having fun. The decks will go up fast, but the garage is dry, and his car is so close he might end up spilling some.

Not sure how he got a maul in his hand, windshield smashed, he flung oil inside. No justice in the world, Gabe-Gabe, not for you, not your mother. Make it even. Just a match to light up the big scene.

He backed away, looking at his truck up the hill. Do it. Stench of gas spinning his head, sweat-soaked shirt clinging to skin. Do it! A sudden wind, the door to the house flying wide. Prove for once you’re a man, not some pussy walking dead.

Flames exploded from the garage and knocked him down. He’d never lit one that big. Hair singed on head and arms, heat burrowing into skin like worms eating him alive. Feel it rise, Gabe-Gabe. Feed it more. Eyes burning in his skull, he fumbled with the door into the house. A hand threw his cigarette down the hall, fire snaking into their bedroom from one pile to the next. He stumbled up the driveway, coughing and shaking.

Sun down, sky darkening, the massive oaks surrounding the house flickered with flame. Come back inside, Gabe-Gabe. Feel it burn. No. The voice, not him, is to blame.

He stank of oil and smoke, his skin raw from the explosion. He touched his face, his mustache burnt to stubble, his eyebrows gone, and his arms black. No. Leave before someone sees flames lighting the sky. He clambered into his truck, a hand pulling on his back.

Your dream house is flying into the night, Gabe-Gabe. Don’t you want to be with it? Make yourself at home; feel the flame. No? Fine. Get lost, then. Poor Gabe-Gabe, no one cares about you. This house was never yours. You were mine.

Now, watch me rise.

Kirk Glaser’s poetry has been nominated twice for the Pushcart Prize, He has work in The Threepenny Review, Nimrod, Chicago Quarterly Review, The American Journal of Poetry, Split Rock Review, The Worcester Review, Catamaran, and elsewhere. His poetry collection, The House That Fire Built, is forthcoming from Mad Hat Press. Awards include an American Academy of Poets prize, C. H. Jones National Poetry Prize and University of California Poet Laureate Award. He teaches writing and literature at Santa Clara University, where he is Director of the Creative Writing Program and Faculty Advisor to the Santa Clara Review. He is co-editor of the anthology New California Writing 2013, Heyday.