Ears Leading

Mona hated her roommates. When there was milk for coffee, it got left out or slopped. Both roomies insisted on continuous cable news, overruling Mona when she reached for the remote. Sometimes, when she was in bed and they were still up—they were always up—she caught her name woven into sarcastic laughter. But what Mona hated most about the invaders—personified pressures as real as school bullies—was the regularity in which she had to squeeze between the two of them, Freddy Financial and Angela Anger, on the roller coaster that wound around the neighborhood and through the strip mall that housed a No Frills grocery, a charity outlet, and an assortment of independents including a vet clinic specializing in cats.

On the last day of each month, her hands tingled in fearful anticipation of getting her fingers trapped by the heavy bar that clamped the trio into the rigid bucket. The morning of the first, before she could brush her teeth, Freddy would guide her to the metal seat, then Angela would shove her from behind. Nausea would strike the instant the rocking lurch jolted them forward.

The ride always slowed at the peak, cresting around the fifteenth. There, Mona shut her eyes through the plunge to the thirtieth as any coins she’d forgotten to secure dropped onto the fiscal fairground below.

When the circuit was complete, Mona would stagger off jelly-legged, only for momentary respite because, by some evil trick of a moved post and chain, she found herself back in line to re-board.

The morning of the twenty-seventh of June, Mona whooshed a scarf around her neck and over her mouth—better than elastic chafing her ears. She headed for the park for no other reason than she couldn’t abide being inside. Besides, if she received another error message while trying to post a profile on secondcareer.com, she’d smash the laptop her kids had gifted her.

Her roomies tagged along but, in two opportune moments, she’d abandoned Angela next to a laminated page of rules posted near the sandbox which held a pink shovel left from pre-pandemic playtime, and ditched Freddy, confounding him by tossing a quarter into the reflecting pool.

She could hear him weeping over wasted money as she stepped under the shade of an immaculate, white marquee, into a presentation that promised enlightenment.

An apricot-gowned male handed Mona a cup of mystery juice. He bowed then led her to a resin chair a hockey-stick’s length from one occupied by a grey-bearded man in denim. When Mona noticed he’d repurposed his blue surgical mask into a headband, she let her scarf fall.

The wind caressed her lips. Mona sipped her drink to calm her libido.

There was no burst of orange; her taste buds messaged 'carrot'. The presented meditational concepts were as confusing as the beverage and, in a moment of unrest, Mona wondered if her roommates had snuck behind to invade her search for peace. Tranquility had never figured much in her past; less this last six months, after Peter walked out of the marriage wearing chinos that had been hanging in Mona’s hairdresser’s closet for the better part of a year.

When the young man collected the cups, he gifted her a little black book.

“Blank pages to dream you can. Beginning is your journey,” said the monk.

Mona wanted to ask if she could exchange it for an Idiot’s Guide To Buddhism or Baha’i For Dummies, but she was more afraid of her ignorance than his spittle. When she closed her eyes, the cover and spine melted into her palm.

“You’re frickin’ Yoda,” said the bearded man when gifted his.

Mona rose, clutched the book to her heart, and it became a moonless night sky. There was clarity in blackness, a new favorite color being none and all at the same time.

She ambled home. Angela in tow looking for kittens to kick. Freddy, the penny-pinching- shutter-down-of ideas, rushing ahead to get the comfy chair.

Home-Sour-Home, Mona placed the little black book beside her laptop on the kitchenette passthrough, then collapsed in her recliner, squishing Freddy with her lumpy bum; so what if her bank-balance this morning read $35.46, as long as the insurance check for $77.00 didn’t clear before Thursday.

The little black book inched closer to the computer and introduced itself while Mona reached for her crocheting—a mighty granny square that threatened to carpet, as in wall to wall. She’d started it the week she’d moved into the townhouse, after receiving the lawyer’s statement reporting her proceeds from the house sale just covered the billing for her side of the divorce.

Fueled by tiny sparks from the lecture in the park, Mona decided on a spiritual DIY session.

“My Kingdom for a clean slate.” She surveyed her empire: simple and unsophisticated, like a poor part of the village.

She closed her eyes and released the hook.

The staging area, where people check in to speak to their spirit-guides, resembled prairie train stations in old movies. Its sparse interior held a ticket kiosk and pew-like seats on a wood-planked floor. Outside, a backless bench paralleled a single track arriving from and disappearing into someone else’s version of home.

Mona imagined the faceless guide past the smudge of her eyelids. “Are you there?”

“Yes.” A slightly familiar male promptly replied.

“Right. Erm, really?”

“Didn’t expect an answer?”

“I wasn’t sure… I thought there’d be a canned greeting.”

“I find ‘yes’ cuts the bull. But I can do the script. Prompt me again.”

“But I’m already talking to you now,” said Mona.

“Technically, the script is required on the first call; you might be one of those reporting types. Seriously, summon me.”

“Shall I wait a few seconds?” Mona relaxed her shoulders. “Ring, Ring. Calling my spirit guide. Ring, Ring.”

“Greetings. The ethereal here. Exclusively yours 24/7. Omnipresent. Press one for English—I was just joking on that last bit on account of you saying ‘ring, ring’.”

“Omnipresent? Like you see me when I’m sleeping?”

“And know when you’re awake,” sang the sarcastic swami.

“So, you see me when I eat a tube of Pringles on the way home from grocery shopping?”

“Especially then.”

“When I crochet?”

“Of course.” A ring of disinterest.

“When I’m naked in the tub?”

“That’s how people bathe.”

“You’re perverted.” Mona shifted; part of the wool project rippled down her legs, joining the mass of color at her feet.

“Look, what is it you want?” asked the anonymous guru.

Mona recalled returning a coffeepot to Costco when customer service was staffed by the guy from the auto-center. Just her luck to get a stand-in sage.

“I want the secrets of the universe… or how to make ends meet. Can you answer that?”

“Yes.”

“Well?” Mona anticipated an outpouring of knowledge to sail her past the rank of His Holiness, The Dalai Lama.

“Actually, our time is up.”

“You’re kidding me. You’re not going to say anything profound? Like ‘the answer is inside you, Mona’? Our time is up? What kind of crap is that?”

“Is that what you want me to say?” The entity spoke.

“Is what what I want you to say?” asked Mona.

“That the answer is inside you,” said the internal coach.

“No. I want the answer, dammit.”

“And if I don’t have it?”

“Well then, I’d ask why you’re here,” said Mona.

“Are you asking me?”

“Yes, I’m asking you. Why are you here?”

“Because I am your spirit-guide?”

Mona noted the uncertainty. “You’re not even sure?”

“Alright already. Because I AM your spirit-guide.”

What a fool she’d been to believe she’d receive a message from another realm. She attempted to shift the self-criticism to a mind-compartment other than the one she’d assigned for the transcendental experience.

“Mona, what if I’m real?” A whisper.

“Impossible. You sound like me with a deeper voice.”

“You want another?”

“Well, maybe a little more exotic.”

“You mean fake?”

“No, I mean authentic. Like Marcello at the Italian.”

“I can do Marcello,” tooted the tutor.

“Do you even know Marcello?” Mona asked.

“No, but you do.” The master’s voice held confidence.

“So?”

“So-ah you can hear it-ah like Marchellow he would-ah speak it.”

Though dizzied, Mona continued the buy in. Kept her eyes shut.

“Okay, so whaddaya want?” The accent implied geriatric impatience.

“To know how to get through this. I need a future.”

“You mentioned that.”

“And you said our time was up.”

“Touché,” said the guide.

“You’re nothing but a phony.”

“If I’m fake, then you’re fake.”

“Show me a sign.” Mona challenged.

The counselor punctuated frustration with a raspy outbreath. “Sheesh, everybody wants a sign.”

“Oh, go to hell you bloody fake. Just forget it,” said Mona.

She opened her eyes, slipped her wedding band from her finger, seized the hook, and looped wool through it. Three single crochets later, the ring was concealed within the blanket.

Ten thousand woolly clusters and all its holes between tumbled to the floor as she walked to the patio door. Her patch of sad grass opened onto the common grounds of the low-rent complex. Removing the bladeless hockey stick from the door-track allowed the window to slide. A puff of road dust swirled about then filtered through the screen, settling on the once-beige carpet.

For the first time in forever, Mona thought about nothing. She stared past the mesh until it disappeared—just like the spots in the microwave door did when she watched her meals rotate.

The computer’s fan engaged.

The little black book smiled.

Mona fixated on a slender jackrabbit nibbling dandelion greens; listened to the little chew-chews and bite-bites. She knelt, pressed her nose against the screen, then eased the tension—God knows it had been hard enough to squeeze together the damage deposit, let alone find a place during lockdown.

The animal stopped munching; stared at Mona.

“Hello.”

The hare shuffled forward, ears leading.

Mona lost herself in the animal’s eyes. Her tears flowed inside, so the saltiness stung the jagged edges where her heart had zigzag-broken. More tears trickled paths along her jawbone, down her neck, and into her cleavage. She longed for a soft washcloth like the pastel ones she’d used on her babies a lifetime ago.

Children’s chatter drifted from the direction of the jungle gym around the corner—siblings, Mona decided. There just wasn’t much mixing these days.

“You should go before they see you.” Mona sniffle-whispered the warning, but the jackrabbit inched closer.

The twitching, velvet nose met her own, like a kiss bestowed by the gentlest angel, a connection through which a message was delivered. It struck old typewriter keys against her heart—seven characters, all lower case:

f o r g i v e

Mona inhaled the elixir of letters whose variations soothed the soul. She became a human rain-stick: forgiven and forgiveness freefalling through all her empty spaces.

She registered the experience as one never to be believed; perhaps never to be shared.

“They’re coming.” The scent of the freshly cut grass sweetened Mona’s warning.

The hare shuffled into an upended cardboard box.

The children moved slowly, laden with cargo. Mona zeroed in on their little red wagon. The afternoon sun turned everything golden and, in the blended orange of rusted metal and weathered red paint, sat her bickering roommates. Captives, bumping about, secured by a skipping rope.

The wagon pullers turned in the direction of the block of family units.

A car backfired.

Someone lit a cigarette.

Under a daytime visible moon.

The little black book summoned Mona.

The laptop chimed an incoming email.

Mona realigned the book’s angle, then clicked the mouse.

The law firm.

A new accountant receiving information from a paralegal intern.

A grave error.

An apology.

An attachment.

A statement with columns of numbers resembling the London underground system.

A balance.

In Mona’s favor.

Twenty thousand dollars.

Mona realigned the book again; swore she’d just straightened it.