From the Bottom...

“I’ve been at this all morning.” he said, nodding determinedly. “I’ll catch this one, you’ll see.” He draped the fishhook into the pool, puffing on his cigar longingly and mumbled about his glory days. He talked a lot about the past, and I gathered that he wanted to recover something, some idea of himself perhaps that had since long gone…

… One spring night, twenty eight years before, he had been walking down 32^nd street when the sun had been setting, ready to rise early and brighter the next morning, when he turned into a wrong alley and was met with two hoods. The first stroking a knife and the second remaining concealed behind him. They demanded his wallet. He obliged. When the hood stared into it, as if in love with the soiled leather and a thousand dollar notes, he decided to look up and received a kiss on his forehead. A .32 calibre bullet. Clutching smudged lip rouge, he tumbled to the floor, oozing the pap of life. The second ran away into the darkness, Frankie Yale, never to return or cross the young man ever again.

His heart beat faster and faster as the lad contorted into a hot mess on the floor. He knew that when he killed this man, and forever wed himself to a life of crime, his mind would change and render him with the mind of a god. At his inconvenience his inauguration was complete at the drop of a hat.

Through all he said, with great enthusiasm, I smiled at him and a phrase attempted to shape itself in my mouth. But I coughed. He sighed. Then he drifted off, resting his chin on his bulging chest and gracefully slumped into a puddle next to the swimming pool, fast asleep, longing to return to that stage in his life when he was nineteen and knew nothing of the world. Both a prince and a pauper. Before the reputation, before the fame, before Alcatraz.

He laid still, remaining uncommunicable forever. I inclined my fedora, picked up my jacket and turned to leave, calling 911 as I quitted the mansion. From the bottom came a bubble, it rested gracefully on the top for a moment, like life and then… popped.