Fat: A Fictional Narrative

Snow was blown bits of metal that would dot your face with blood if you rode your bike fast enough. Rain became hard splats of gum and a breeze was something that could rip hair out of your head. Sue Lynn had raced him down a hill so high it seemed to be a mountain. They called it Sack Mountain but his momma said it was really a hill. If you wanted to see a mountain, there was the Rockies where she grew up. As if you could compare them. One was stone teeth in the sky and the other a mound of grass and gravel that blocked everything until you reached the top. One was warmed with green and gold leaves of oak, the other blue and sterilized by cold. It was like running in two different directions at once. Couldn't be done.

The wild apple tree was the same knobby but oddly lacy ones that were in her mother's garden. She had walked past it for 10 years, never paying attention before. But this was the first time Virginia saw a man sitting in the middle of the branches. He didn't glance her way but kept watching the sky as she got closer.

Then she recognized him. "Mr. Graham what are you doing in the tree?" She waited for him to respond, shuffling her feet in place, trying to keep warm.

"Mr. Graham?"

His white hair was stuck up in wiggly strands and his windbreaker was zipped all the way to his chin. Being the only flesh you could see, his head looked as if it was added on and foreign to the rest of him. She followed the track of his gaze and saw nothing but an expanse of white.

“Is everything okay, Mr. Graham?” She stepped closer to the tree and squinted over her shoulder in hopes someone, preferably an adult, would appear. No such luck. She watched him a few more minutes. He seemed fine. His face was serene but not spookily so....

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... fog the air. Her mother shut off the television when she slammed the door behind her.

“You alright Ginnie?”

“Yeah.” She shrugged out of her coat. “Mr. Graham died.”

“I know.”

“Right there, in the tree.”

“I know. You want some cocoa?” Angela went into the kitchen and turned the stove top on, feeling the heat against her face. “He once was married to my sister. You know, the one who died climbing the mountain. He was with her. I haven't been able to forgive him until now. I think he was trying to say sorry he'd dragged her up every mountain he could find and that's why he was staring at our house from that tree.”

Virginia opened her mouth then closed it again. He hadn't been staring at the house. He'd been staring at the sky, as if looking for something or waiting for someone. She shivered and took the warm cup from her mothers hands, suddenly cold again.