Playing Fair and Being Kind

This is the time of year for me that is the most anxiety filled. Simply, it is overly stacked with events and requirements and wishes for good luck and hopes for weather conditions that are as reliable as Maine weather can be. I need to file income taxes in order to get my usual modest refund, fish around in the cushions of my recliner to capture any change, and sell what I can to gain some capital for my annual trip south and west and out of here. I also have to change over the tires on the SAAB from studded snows to regular highway tires. The heating oil in the big tank outside my window is down to a few drops and I can’t really afford to fill it because the oil companies hate to deliver just a few gallons. They want to fill it all the way to justify the trip to my shack on Hodgdon Island.

Other tasks include arranging for someone to pick up my mail for three months, get the plumber to come and drain the water systems and fill all the traps with anti-freeze, and make sure there are no items on my food storage shelves that can burst if they freeze. There are many things to consider if I want to leave during the winter months. Therefore I get a bit frantic during this period.

Today and for the past few days, snow has fallen and I have already cancelled my appointment to change the tires out. More small irritations have cropped up and I am practicing “serenity now!”

I am also writing a story in the way of magical realism that I want to have ready for tomorrow night, the writers group at the library. I have it finished and in it’s crude form I present it to you fine folks. I hope you like it. The woman in the story is modeled after one of my closest friends. Here it is.

AIR GUITAR AND ASSASSINATION

The three came together, in 1982, for an evening of flamenco guitar at Jordan Hall in Boston. If I count myself we are four. A quartet at Jordan Hall. The others were Carlos Montoya, Christopher Joseph O’Reilly, and Neptuna Fiorella. I am Harry Goodenough, a semi-retired merchant seaman. I live about a mile from Jordan Hall in a rented studio apartment on the seedy north slope of Beacon Hill; the old West End neighborhood of Boston. I’d walked over to Huntington Ave. near Mass. Ave. to see this concert featuring the world famous flamenco guitarist Carlos Montoya. An added layer of entertainment was added to the evening’s performance that I was not expecting. I had a good view of the show from my balcony seat above the audience to the right of the stage.

I ought to give a brief biography of each of the others and set the stage to help in explaining this scene. Carlos Montoya, of course has been described earlier. He is much older; in his eighties but still capable of performing in front of large venues. He plays the acoustic guitar while seated in a straight back chair, center stage front. He is only about a dozen feet away from the front row of seats and the house lights remain up during the whole performance. The people in the front few rows can see Montoya in great detail and he can see them just as clearly.

Christopher Joseph O’Reilly is a young man from Boston; Jamaica Plain to be precise. He is attending alone and he has procured a seat in the front row directly in front of Montoya. O’Reilly is a guitar aficionado and has pipe dreams of traveling to Sweden to attend one of the first Air Guitar World Championships. He is going as a spectator with hopes to discover enough to practice and compete in the future. O’Reilly has already chosen his stage name of “Chris ‘Rock a Pussy’ O’Really”. He senses that the world is his oyster and his future is so bright that he needs sunglasses. In fact he wears sunglasses all of the time and has let his hair grow long and it is bleached a platinum blond. Chris “Rock a Pussy” O’Really has stopped grooming himself and his appearance can be unsettling to those who are unfamiliar with the counter cultural youth who have grown up hating disco music and distrusting anyone over the age of thirty. The young man has dropped out of high school and lives on the streets of Boston. He conveniently shows up at his parent’s home in JP to score a dinner and get a monetary handout. Christopher has arrived at Jordan Hall to study the famous Carlos Montoya’s playing style.

Neptuna Fiorella is the least known person in the audience at Jordan Hall. She is an undercover asset for many foreign agencies. She is a highly skilled assassin. She lives in Boston and regularly attends music events here and at Symphony Hall located on Mass. Ave just a block away. Neptuna stays in a condo located on Mass. Ave. near the Boston University bridge that crosses the Charles River. Her career began in Mexico City fifteen years earlier when she was a teenager on a church sponsored trip to do missionary work in the mountains surrounding the DF. She was a rebellious young woman then. Fifteen years old and fully aware of the limitations the organization placed on her and her school mates. Neptuna, not her real name, was one of about a dozen youths who abandoned the church while in Mexico City and disappeared into the thin air. She rode a bus to Cuernavaca where she hid out in one of the many “colonias” that make up the city. In a few years a man whom she had befriended recruited her into an international cadre of operatives. From there she quickly attained a reputation for loyalty and courage. At six feet tall and polished good looks Neptuna was used primarily as an assassin of high level government administrators. She eventually reached a level of competence that allowed her to be independent of any government. Neptuna is now freelancing and no one knows her whereabouts unless she wants them to. She is sitting directly behind Christopher at the Carlos Montoya concert.

Neither of the two in the audience are noticeable at the beginning of the performance. Montoya is introduced by a man in formal wear and then left alone in his chair by the front of the stage. He opens with a flamenco piece that is rather short and the audience begins to warm to him and Montoya relaxes into his body and plays more flamenco music. This is when I notice Christopher Joseph O’Reilly. He begins to bob his head slightly and his hands start to move as if he is holding a guitar in his lap. I’m a bit irritated that this guy is not sitting quietly and respectfully still. It gets worse quickly.

Montoya is playing his guitar and I notice that he is noticing Christopher Joseph O’Reilly too. My discomfort escalates rapidly. The platinum blond hair is shaking now and the young man is actually playing air guitar right there not a dozen feet away from the virtuoso! I’m aghast! Montoya is now focused on Chris “Rock the Pussy” O’Really. He can’t take his eyes off this other performance. Others nearby the younger man are beginning to take notice. This is when I first become aware of Neptuna Fiorella.

A lovely woman with short black hair is sitting directly behind “Rock the Pussy”. She leans forward in her seat and gracefully places her right hand on the nape of our air guitarist’s neck. As she does this her beautiful face comes close to his left ear and she appears to whisper something to him. “Rock the Pussy” stops all motion and seems to be listening to Neptuna’s words. He becomes still and his hands relax onto his lap. Neptuna sits back in her seat and after a few moments the atmosphere in Jordan Hall returns to what is was before the minor interruption.

I am at once astonished and intrigued by this activity and amazed with the deftness by which the mysterious goddess has diffused the condition. She sits quietly and she is focused on Montoya. It’s as if the scene never occurred. During the remainder of the performance before the intermission Christopher Joseph O’Reilly is very still and makes not one movement. His behavior is perfect.

I take a break during the intermission and when I return to my seat I notice Christopher is still sitting quietly in his front row seat and he remains so for the remainder of the concert. I wonder what it was that Neptuna said to him and I look for her but she must have left during the break. Montoya finishes his performance and the people leave. I go out to Huntington Avenue with the crowd and walk back to my studio apartment on Beacon Hill. Along the way I pick up a pizza on Charles Street. What a lovely evening it’s been.

G. M. Goodwin

16 January 2016