"Okay, okay," and she did put it down.

  "You can't keep it.  My mom got it for me." 

  "Unlike my rented shoes," the woman looked down at her barefeet. 

  "Who let the thugs in?" 

  "They want the rental furniture." 

  "How's your day?" 

  "Seriously?" 

  "Put all that on that table," a woman ordered.  

  "Well, here we are.  When I said (i)meet my mother(i) this is not what (i)I(i) had in mind." 

  "Go!" 

  "Where?" 

  "To your old room.  Get yourself UN-half neked." 

  "Look, I think I know what happened." 

  "Your father is (i)angry with you(i).  I'd put on non-trashy clothing." 

  "Professional, not trashy." 

  "Same thing where you been (i)supposedly(i) working." 

  The girl came back in a sweatshirt, her father's team. 

  "What do (i)you think(i) happened?" 

  "Well, it got a lil out of control.  Not sharing outfits, but renting outfits out to get lunch money." 

  "Who's going to pay the bill?" 

  "Not sure." 

  "What else?" 

  Quiet.  The mom putting grapefruits into a cupboard.  She turned and rocked the grapefruit in her hand, not exactly pointing at the girl.  "I know you always have more than one thing going on in that head of yours." 

  The girl got on the floor and said loudly to under the couch, "They're still here." She pulled out an alligator slipper.  "Of course they are," the mom said. 

  "Can I have a grapefruit?" 

  "The cost went up again." 

  The girl turned out sweatpant pockets.  "I'll buy us one.  How much m'am?" 

  "Cost me almost two, so two and twenty-five." 

  "Don't you even have a quarter?" 

  A vigorous headshake (i)no(i).  Heavy ponytail. 

  "Sugar?" 

  "Just a little." 

  "Pretty much a lot can't be said.  Revealing sources and all." 

  "Yeah." 

  "Wow. Real grapefruit spoons.  My mom has these too." 

  "We didn't steal yours." 

  "Awkward." 

  Cups for the juice. 

  "Better?" 

  A sigh.  "I remembered something else on the way here." 

  "Do tell." 

  "I think I may have used the wrong word with someone." 

  "Someone like who?" 

  "Ashtray." 

  "He's pretty cool when he's not quarterbacking." 

  Quiet.  "Clean up the table when you're finished." The mom turned out the light as she was leaving the room. 

  "What word?" 

  "(i)Compromised(i)." 

  "How did you mean it?" 

  "Okay, so, you know how (i)they(i) make a kill circle?" 

  "Like around a sub?" 

  "Yeah.  Or around the guy to protect." 

  "Yeah." 

  "I was trying, in a rush, to explain that most of my friends are feeling compromised.  'Cuz, it, it's like, protecting that guy," a point at a guy on a book jacket, "yeah?" 

  "Well it seems like it goes against everything (i)my people(i) have been hoping for." 

  "Okay, I get that.  But this is the Hill.  First of all we have no (i)friends(i).  And secondly, like we are compassed about by enemies who only know the English, (i)Death to America(i)." 

  "Is that a talking point? I heard it on the radio too." 

  "Are all, uh, colors of people your people?" 

  "Oh my God.  You gotta move your car, my Dad's back.  That's not good." 

"Why is your cross or whatever (i)plain(i)?"

  The man looked at it hanging on the wall.  He looked at all the people on the floor of his condo-like place.  And he looked at the woman looking at him.  In his pajamas.  And she was already ready for the day.  He reached for his bathrobe and as he was donning it he asked, "Why does your friend go with an asshole or whatever?" People started to stir at the sound of talking. 

  "You first." 

  "Is there coffee?" 

  "At a coffeeshop." 

  "It's been a bit of a briefcase exchange," a woman said of having some new leads.  "So I better start checking these out." 

  Relentlessly beautiful, so the attempts to bed were relentless. 

  "Newspapers made this all easier." 

  "How so?" 

  "We could just post a mugshot of a freak and everybody would see it, talk about it, maybe do something about it.  Now nobody who's anybody sits around watching all these TV channels." 

  "That's why some of us have been pounding the pavement." 

  "Have it upstairs by ten." 

  "Because Jesus beat death.  (i)Rose from the dead(i)." 

  "Because she goes with a mu," 

  "PERSON who wants her to stay traditional," another woman interjected. 

"Even if that is the truth we can't go with it."

  A man listed the reasons why not.  Right at the top of the list was a nausea-producing rivalry that shouldn't have existed.  The disparity between total control and controlled chaos had grown.  In that mix was a terrible chance for confusion, lack of clarity, and a subtle but potent (i)fuck you then(i).  

  The man's eyes turned icey when he realized something had gone awry with a command. 

  "We're going to have to talk about this." 

  "Who did this?" 

  "Was it spliced?" 

  "Which one is the real news?" 

  Both media were "reporting" a shooting on the mall.  The actual news had sent a reporter to a scene that showed "normal", if there had been somebody shooting a gun, no one there at the time had seen or reported the incident.  Another "news" was witnessing an entirely different reality unfolding.  Both marked (i)news(i), both caught in a twisting between propaganda and reality. 

  "Just turn it off.  We need to sleep." 

"Maw, maw, maw," "the man's eyes

  were buggin," the two people that had carried the man, hands under armpits, into "the shelter", called and called for "a little help please". 

  "Wait, what is he trying to say?" Asked a woman people had seen around, but nobody could say they knew anybody even if they did. 

  "Maybe the guy wants his mother," said an NG who'd been bussed from Brownsville. 

  The man was clearly stuck on trying to say something.  "Wait, don't leave," but the human carriers rested the man in a corner and did leave. 

  "They'll be back," someone said as they stole the man's watch.  "Why would you say that?" The woman asked.  "I wouldn't steal from a guy having a heart attack; would you?" The NG wrestled the man's wallet from his pants pocket.  "Find out who he is," he told the woman.  She slipped out the door. 

"The Chinese shoot last."

  "Oh, so they've teamed up against America have they?" Asked a British submarine man. 

  "What does that mean?" 

  "It's kinda gross." 

  "You need to tell us." 

  "Enemies use every ounce of info and pound of flesh they get a hold of." 

  "You mean cah," two people put sweaty hands over the person's face to prevent the person from saying the word and having more people in the broom closet.  More people would mean more troubles. 

  "It also means cats will play with mice even after they're dead but the cats aren't hungry." 

  "Talk about disinformation.  The dead American said (i)blah, blah, blah(i)." 

  "And (i)yaddah, yaddah,(i) I gotta go." 

"Put the skeletons back in the closet," an older Stateswoman

  warned the few young people still creeping around and cut-throating.  By then it was "on the street" that a war was on.  Even the "cause people" folded it up and started to clear out of D.C. 

  "Am I crazy?" 

  "Nobody has suggested anyone ask that question.  This has been a fork in the wheel, this bunch." 

  "But what about (i)diversity(i)?" 

  "What about it?  If that's your thing, (i)go do it(i).  These are (i)traditional(i) people at the helm now." 

  "Put that in (i)Special Interest(i)." Eventually the bin of special interest overflowed.  And Recycling wasn't really real. 

  "Miss you." 

  (i)PROcedurally then, you'll all have three minutes.(i) The Court's group had sent someone over. 

  Downturned eyes, looks of no hope, clear bags holding belongings.  

  "Start editing." 

  "Why do you have fifty folders?" 

  "Stay focused." 

  A cellphone ringing. 

  "Why are you calling me?" 

  "You're father is dying." 

  "Are you going to the hospital?" 

  "It wouldn't do either of us any good at this point." 

  "Speaking of parents, I really need to check on mine." 

  "Take the rest of the day off." 

Who's framing who? Was the

  winning question for the grownup/kid essay contest.  For us, the question came to light in a nightmarish joking kind of way as various neighborhood men decided upon career. 

  "Dick, I mean, Richard, uh, why is your dog drinking our toilet water?  Did you not come home last night?" 

  "Tailed.  And whoever it was is still in the neighborhood." Both dog and man panting. 

  I will say that "escapades" and "techniques" used amongst civilian population made us all collateral damage and disposable in the Nations' fight for "supremacy".  It fueled the danger until the men and women insisting on law and order in the Homeland got themselves properly attached to established organizations of America.  This didn't eliminate the branches of "justice", it made us briefly "great" again. 

Dad called it "the dummy".

  Sometimes it was a man, sometimes a woman.  Scrutinized either way.  How a cloth hangs; how it might clash; how a color or texture might look (i)if there were miles more of it for my fat ass(i) a lady said.  With pushpins in her mouth mom just listened and got a lot of insight, like peeks, into people.  How they thought about stuff, and almost like, what they were expecting out of an outfit. 

  One morning Dad got his bathtowel stuck on the thing.  It came off.  The dog was following Dad and a couple of the kids were following the dog.  "DAD!  What are you doing?" A little girl asked.  A son smacking a butt cheek like the dining room was a locker room. 

  Another morning the dummy was being punched by a brother who was letting loose on the thing.  Parents just listened and came to know that child was having a problem with a teacher.  (i)Okay,(i) mom tried to explain, (i)I hate you is okay to say to the dummy, but not the real teacher(i).  Mom wheeled the dummy into a corner and threw the Afghan on it.  Afraid of it's power to have unleashed so much anger in the small boy. 

  It stayed there for a little while until she made a performance of inviting it out of the corner and to dinner so people could (i)apologize(i). 

  Sometimes the dummy would be posed and drawn.  Sometimes mom would sew arms and legs onto it.  And she used it more than once to make it look like someone was home when Dad had to stay at work late and she wanted to go to sleep like us.  

  "MOM CAN WE USE THE DUMMY?" One sweaty, red faced kid was getting an idea as other boys were relaying the story of finding a dead body, seeing it was shot, and being like plagued with the (i)mystery(i).  That was how the dummy got it's first and only hole that wasn't a pin.  (i)Trajectory,(i) a beautiful woman with a penchant for mystery named technical words for such things.  Next morning the dummy had mom's lipstick on it until mom cleaned that off and put it in the closet. 

They'd taken more soft targets.

  Enemies within the Country were falling away from defending the Republic.  Falling away from Judeo-Christian values.  Falling away from family.  It wasn't difficult to lure.  Trap.  Soft kidnap.  Blackmail.  Disappear.  It would've been unthinkable to the Greatest Generation for this to happen (i)here(i).  

  The house behind the old oak tree with the yellow ribbon around it had stayed mostly dark.  Curtains pulled tight.  The smell of nicotine like cans of tuna not rinsed out. 

  "Why (i)one nation under God(i)?" A kid asked a weathered old man dropping off a trashcan of dogfood.  "On account of the Commies," the old man said.  "They're like one bunch of groups of brutal animals under a couple dictators." The man spit and the plug of tobacco slipped out too.  He picked it up and let his fingers wipe off the dirt.  Put it back in his mouth.  "War changed a lot of our men into brutal animals too.  It's a pickle.  We're having to relearn how to fear God and obey outtah respect.  This is a real mess," the man pulled at wire mesh put over a hole in the wall out back.  It had become a squirrel's nest.  People knew that but didn't want to mess with a missing man's property. 

  "OW, OWIE, GOSHDARNIT," the man had cut his finger and sucked on his own blood.  He had bloody teeth when he winced, then smiled.  "I know where we can get a bandaid!  Come with me." 

"What are they waiting for?"

  By dawn's early light someone was trying to scrape an American flag sticker in tact from someone's car window.  Also, people were sharing sticks of Juicy Fruit and Big Red. 

  "Where's Dick?" Somebody asked.  "Hmmmm...maybe with Jane.". Nobody laughed.  

  Only one girl had a picture of the man in her photo album billfold.  

  "Have you seen this man?" 

 

The sound cut out on

  "REMEMBAH YOUR GOAL," the self-ascribed "political animal" had raised his arms like the Brazilian Jesus. 

  "Guy thinks he's the Savior of the world," one guy commented at a monitor.  "Maybe of the masses.  Turn it up," said another guy.  "Doesn't get any louder." 

  Two Corporate women were trying to guess how their boards would vote on uniforms when the elevators fritzed.