Fiction | No Such Thing As Dreams

The Great Guzzler, legend of Chadwick county, bore the weight of history in his gut as he drank. Eight time champion in a long line of champions, the living hero born with a can in hand was piling away beers faster than anyone could imagine. He drank and he drank, and just when it seemed like he couldn’t possibly keep going, he drank some more. He drank so much that his belly blew up twice its size and sloshed about when he moved like he was containing an entire ocean within him; drank so much that it looked it like he’d pop like a balloon if pricked with a needle; drank so much that his vision went funny and his words slurred and his skin transformed into a thousand shades of red. He finished beer after beer, but it wasn’t ever enough, so he reached out and cracked open another. The people cheered. The sky was blue. Behind him, a field of wheat waved brilliant gold.

Sally Eagleton watched him from the make-shift bleachers, cheering along with the rest of everyone she’d known all long as she could remember — her family and neighbors and fellow church-goers and those people normally called strangers but in Chadwick were called friends because everybody knew everybody, even when they didn’t — but her heart wasn’t in it. What’ll I do? she thought, cupping her hands around her mouth and hollering some encouragement. What’ll I do? I know, I’ll drive my car off the road, clean off, I’ll drive it off. Yes, that’s what I’ll do. I’ll drive it off. Another tab popped, beer fizzed, the crowd went wild. Oh, what’ll I do?

Two hours earlier, while viewing the pig race put on by Old Mickey in preparation for the main event later in the day, she had a vision. It happened suddenly and without warning. In less time it takes to blink an eye, Sally became convinced that at precisely one thirty-eight in the afternoon, her skin would peel apart from the rest of her and kill her entire family. She’d never been more sure of anything in her entire thirty-seven years of living. Even her belief in God didn’t compare to the certainty she felt that she would, in a matter of hours, be watching her outsides leave her insides, body and face kissing her man and her daughter and then stabbing them both clean through their backs.

She knew she couldn’t tell anyone, of course. It’d only upset folks. And besides, it’d ruin her baby girl’s big day if she thought her mother was some kind of freak, so she kept that smile that won her the 1978 County Fair pageant plastered perfect across her face and watched the Great Guzzler guzzle more beers than were stocked in the entire fair, everyone laughing and clapping and cheering on the best of them while she planned on how to kill herself.

It’s not like this was the first time she’d considered ways to die. She’d thought about it plenty over the course of her life — how she could take too many pills or jump off a roof or tie some rocks to her feet and walk into Constantinople Lake. She could throw a toaster in the bath, hang herself from the ceiling fan, cut open her guts with a kitchen knife like those samurai used to do in the movies. Harry Carry, they called it. She’d thought about her end a thousand times just as she’d thought of her own funeral a thousand times, picturing exactly how she’d like to have it done and exactly how everyone would take the news. Her husband would cry for the first time in years and never remarry because he’d already found the one. Or no, he’d marry someone else but only after a nice long while and it’d be gentle and chaste and beautiful, and her daughter would one day have a kid and name them after her, and her parents, well, they’d be perfectly inconsolable. Yes, she’d thought about it plenty. This was just the first time she meant it.

Her favorite pig to win the races, little Maple Brown, was in the lead when it happened. Maple Brown hadn’t ever won before, not even in the preliminaries, though not for a lack of trying. Year after year that pig ran its cute behind off only to come in last. Last, last, last. Sally knew they didn’t have much time left; they’d be out of the racing world sooner than not, and then where would Maple Brown be? A pile of bacon for breakfast, probably. But she didn’t love the pig for its talents. She cared because of Maple Brown’s nose. Right there on the snout was a splotch of brown that looked exactly like the birthmark under Sally’s right arm. The resemblance was uncanny: that messy, unsightly splash her own mother explained away as Sally getting in a mud fight with God before she arrived on Earth. Nobody else noticed the similarity — she tried to tell her husband, but he didn’t pay any attention, and her daughter didn’t care for pigs much at all in the first place — but it was fine. It didn’t matter. Sally knew the marks were the same, and that was enough reason for her to put all her faith in Maple Brown.

They were running well that morning, or at least better than they ever had. One of the favorites to win, Ham & Cheese, stumbled and caused a three pig pile-up, leaving a real chance at a spot in the main race open to Maple Brown for the very first time, and they seemed intent to take it. Their stubby legs were kicking up dirt like a tornado, rushing right on past the pile and then one, two, three other piggies still racing. They weren’t in first, weren’t even close, but to Sally, that pig was taking home the gold. Keep on running, Maple Brown, she thought. Don’t you ever stop running. No matter what, you gotta keep on running. And then the gun fired and signaled the race to a close and in that second of a second of booming gunpowder, Sally saw her future. The back of the main stage, a rope and a levy, her daughter smiling and her husband frowning. Her skin walking towards them, her muscle and guts and blood and brain left in a pile by the curtain. Scissors in the husband’s back, a river of his blood. And her daughter…

The crowd erupted. The Great Guzzler had fallen off the stage, totally unconscious. The thunk of his body made Sally jump. Everyone flew out of their seats and surrounded him, some trying to help the poor man up, others slapping his cheeks awake or spilling their own drinks on the already drenched drunk. If only that were an option, drinking myself to death. She thought it sounded about as nice a way to go as any. A shame there wasn’t enough time for it.

Her daughter was set to be in the pageant show at one. They’d been working together towards it for months. For years, even. They shared their blood, sweat, and tears with each other, but also with the past, because once her girl was all prettied up with her make-up and dress, Sally felt like she was looking straight into a mirror. No, that wasn’t quite right. She saw herself, but only a collection of the smallest bits — the best bits, the bits that if she’d seen and cared for at the time might’ve let Sally grow into an altogether different her than the mess she ended up being — all gathered up into something so much greater and more beautiful than she could’ve ever dreamed of. Her daughter had the chance to really be somebody. She could be a star. Oh, what’ll I do?

“Mom!”

A voice calling. Sally was the only one still in the bleachers.

“Suzie, what are you — don’t look at him, dear, don’t pay any attention to him — what are you doing here? Aren’t you meant to be with the rest of the girls? The show’ll start soon.”

Her daughter’s name was Susan but Sally liked calling her Suzie. Nobody else did, not her father or her friends or her grandparents or anybody. It was a name just for Sally, even if

Suzie didn’t like it much.

“They said we have some time, said we can do what we want but don’t be late or you’ll miss your chance and embarrass yourself in front of everyone who’s anyone, and you wouldn’t want that, now would you?”

Sally looked at her watch. It was old, a gift from her own mother, who’d received it from grandma, who got it when she turned thirteen, and which Sally had intended to give to Suzie someday too but now knew she wouldn’t have the chance. It clicked the seconds by loudly. Twelve thirty.

“No, we wouldn’t,” Sally said. No, no, no, why couldn’t you stay there, why couldn’t you leave me, get away from me, get away, please. “Let’s head on back, I bet dad is already waiting.” Suzie took her mom’s hand. She felt the watch tick.

Her husband was working security for the fair, which he’d been doing for five years in a row now. He’d gotten good at it, found some respect in the act even though the most action he ever saw was scaring a group of kids who tried to steal some caramel corn or haul the Great Guzzler back on to his camp after a show. Still, it made him feel important and made others feel the same, and so Sally was happy for him, and turned a blind eye to those nights he stayed a little too long with the kind of people she wished he wouldn’t, pretending to be someone more special than he was. She knew how important the fair was to him, after all.

The two of them had met at the fair all those years ago, each working their church’s respective food stands. Her selling funnel cakes, him corn on the cob; a modern day Romeo and Juliet. She thought it was love at first sight at the time, staring all day at that gorgeous boy across the aisle while butterflies danced in her stomach, but she later realized those butterflies must’ve just been all that funnel cake in her belly, because they never danced much after that. Instead she got pregnant a little too early and they married a little too soon and she learned how to love him slowly and over time, like figuring out a new language.

Sally and Suzie walked past the funnel cakes and corn, stalls still standing all these years later. It was a beautiful day, the kind dreams are made of: sun shining with breeze gentle and only a few funny looking clouds peppering the sky to give all that blue some personality. If only I could go back, Sally thought, staring at the stand, which they called a stand but was actually a makeshift trailer. If only I could be back in there. Everything would be so much easier. I‘d dunk my head in the oil and be done with it, burn my skin to a crisp and my brain along with it.

As they walked and talked — “Can we go to the sunflower maze? The other girls said they’re going to the sunflower maze. One of them says their dad owns the whole thing. Can you imagine? All those sunflowers, all your own.” “I’m telling you, Maple Brown is going far this year. She’s going all the way. It’s a shame they put the finals at the same time as your show. A crying shame. Did I mention that Ham & Cheese is out? I did? Well they are…” “Who was that man? Is he okay? Why did he look like that? Why won’t you tell me?” — Sally searched desperately for a way to die. Maybe her keys would work. She’d take the biggest one she had, the one meant for her car, hide in one of the porta potties, jam it as deep as she could into her neck and pull, pull, pull. Oh, but what if she didn’t have the strength? What if she only gives herself a big bruise or gets it jammed while trying to unlock her head? Maybe she could steal the kebab skewer that kid has there and shove it through her ear, or the fork that woman is using and push it deep into her eye, mash potato mixing up with eyeball until there’s no telling one from the other.

For a moment she thought about overdosing, taking all the drugs she’s got in her purse all at once and letting them work their magic, but she gave up on that idea quicker than any of the others. It’d be too slow, and besides, she only had a couple Tylenol, anyway. But then if not drugs, what about bug spray? There was plenty of it laying all over the place; stuff to keep mosquitos away and suffocate hornets and even make the invincible cockroach croak in seconds. All she’d have to do is take a bottle while nobody was looking, shove the nozzle down her throat, and pull the trigger. It’d be easy, her insides would be soup in a second. That’s it, it’s perfect, it can’t fail. I’ll become an ant, I’ll turn into a bug, I’ll be a roach and die like a good bug should. Thank god, thank god, I finally know what to do.

As if on cue, coming up in reaching distance was just the kind of spray she was looking for, sitting unguarded at the edge of a family’s picnic blanket. A couple more steps, only a couple more and she could grab it and end things before anybody knew what was happening. An insect’s end. Only two steps more. A fine way to go. Only a bit further.

“Now what are you two lovely ladies doing all the way out here?”

No. Please, no.

“Daddy!”

“Hey, little girl. Kiss? Thank you. And how about one from the big girl?”

Sally hugged her husband and kissed him and watched the bug spray, her way out, disappear behind his head.

“Something wrong?”

“No,” she said. ”No, It’s fine, I’m fine, everything’s fine. I’m confused is all.“ She tried to laugh. “Nobody seems to be where they’re supposed to be today.”

“Well, see, I just had to take my break a smidge early. Didn’t want to be caught hauling off some drunk when the star takes the stage. What say we all head over together?”

Suzie smiled. Sally’s husband smiled. Sally tried her best to smile, too. Her watch continued to tick away the seconds.

Suzie liked her dad more than her mom, or at least that’s what Sally suspected. Everyone always insisted that’s how it is, that young girls have a daddy phase, and to be sure so did Sally, but surely it hadn’t been like it is now. Surely it hadn’t lasted so long.

Those first few days after her Suzie was born were the worst in Sally’s life. She’d seen the shows and heard the stories: how wonderful it is to hold the child, how beautiful it is, how suddenly your life isn’t only your own. So why was it that when she first saw her daughter she felt nothing? Not love, not adoration, not wonder, not even hate. Just nothing at all. It tore her up inside, stripped her heart into nice long strings. And all the while there he was saying “Isn’t she lovely? Isn’t she a miracle?” After a few weeks the love came in hard and true, but she’d never been able to forget that guilt of emptiness of those first few days, the jealousy and distrust.

Maybe Suzie knew, somewhere deep inside, in those places beyond memory. Maybe she knew and that’s why she loved her less.

But there wasn’t any time to think about what ifs and regrets. Time was drawing close and she wasn’t anywhere closer to dying than when she’d woken up.

“Hey, Mike. You got a sec?”

Mike let go of his family and turned to see Rachel Wilson waving a hand their way. Rachel was a friend of Sally’s husband. They’d met the first year he started with all this security business and had become a staple sight since then, coming around the house for dinner or to babysit or to take Mike drinking with folks Sally only knew enough to know she didn’t care for much.

“You hear what happened to Tim? Yeah? Well, John’s real mad about it. Yes, that John. Mad isn’t even the right word, he’s gone right crazy, and — well, that’s not the point. The point is, you won’t believe what he said a second ago. He said—“ A glance to Sally. ”Sorry, Sal, you don’t mind if I borrow your husband, do you?”

“Please, Rachel,” Sally said, “you’d be doing me a favor. I‘ll take any break I can get from seeing his mug.”

Rachel laughed and Mike gave Sally a look that meant “I’m sorry,” even though he wasn’t, really. “I’ll catch up with you two beauties in a minute, don’t you worry. Wouldn’t miss the show for the world.” Then to Rachel, “So what did old John say? He did? That doesn’t sound like him, the John I know would be celebrating a touch of alcohol poisoning…”

Sally knew it was fine, she knew they were nothing more than friendly. She knew. But what if? They talked so well together, made him look like he used to back when he was still at the corn stand. Back in those days he was so charming. Back in those days he was so kind. He still was, but it hadn’t felt the same for years. Or maybe that was just it: it was exactly the same.

The same forever until the tips of her fingers are stained with his blood, and the stage light shines right through her skin to the whole world polka dot red.

“Mom, mom, look. Look at that.” Suzie didn’t seem to care either way. She tugged and pointed to a stand with a long line and sign reading Deep-Fried Kool-Aid. A crowd of people loitered around, cupping paper boats filled with blobs of burnt batter oozing familiar red. “We have to try it. We can try it, right? Let’s try it.”

In the very back of the line was a man wearing a white shirt tucked into blue jeans, gun holstered loudly at his waist. A gun. Of course, it makes so much sense. Why didn’t I think of it earlier? I’ll kill myself with a gun. They’re quick, they’re easy, they’re everywhere I look. Yes, I’ll kill myself with a gun, with that gun right there.

“Sure, dear,” she said. ”Gosh, they’ll deep fry anything these days, won’t they?”

The watch hand moved. One o’clock.

She knew how to use a gun. When she was a kid living out in nowhere, her father had a rifle he kept wrapped up in the basement. For a long time she didn’t even realize it was a gun until the day he took it out to shoot a raccoon that got caught under the backyard fence. Shot it right in the head. There was blood and there was ringing. “You got to put some creatures out of their misery,” he told her. Years later, he took her out into the plains, handed her the rifle, and had her shoot at some empty bottles. Pulling the trigger was easier than she thought it’d be. It felt nicer than she thought, too. He never made her touch it again.

She knew how to use one just fine, but the doubts wouldn’t stop coming. What if she was too slow? What if the man stopped her? What if the safety was on, or she took too long and the crowd tackled her still breathing to the ground? And anyway, what if, in some freak chance, she missed? What if she shot in exactly the wrong place so that instead of dying she was left paralyzed in bed for the rest of time? Her brain might suffer, but her skin wouldn’t mind. It’d be all too happy to jump out all the same. What if, what if, what if. Without even noticing, her entire life had become nothing but a series of what if’s.

By the time they’d reached the stand, a family of five had beaten them into line, crowded behind and swallowing up the man with the gun.

“Forget it,” Sally said suddenly, jerking back on her daughter’s arm. “You don’t need junk like that. Especially not now. Not minutes before the show. You’ve got to watch yourself, watch your weight. Can’t have you suddenly turning fat. You wouldn’t want that, would you? I know, I know you wouldn’t. Here, if you’re hungry, have some trail mix. What? I took the M&Ms out. No, I didn’t eat them. They’re in their own baggy at home. Come on now, you can walk and eat. We have to keep moving if we’re going to make it. Honestly, who ever heard of a thing as silly as deep fried Kool-Aid.”

They walked and they nibbled and all the while Sally wondered what can I do, what can I do? There wasn’t much time left. The stage was in sight. Her watch kept ticking, Suzie kept munching, strangers kept laughing. Laughing and staring. They knew. She was sure of it. They all knew what was about to happen. Do I choke on something, let the trail mix take me away? Take a pen from the satisfaction survey folks and pretend to fall with the tip pointed up to ink my heart? Excuse myself for a moment so I can jump in front of a leaving car? Bash my head into the concrete until the brain stops working? So many thoughts, so many ideas, and each one felt more foolish than the last. The watch, the watch, its hands always creeping. Her skin stirred.

Come to think of it, Sally remembered her grandmother telling a similar story to her predicament, but instead of skin it was teeth. When she was younger, before Sally and before Sally’s mother, back when that watch was new, she’d have dreams about all of her teeth falling out. Every night like clockwork, visions of her mouth suddenly excavated. And when she’d bend down to try and pick her teeth back up, she’d realize that they weren’t her teeth at all, but thirty-two small men giggling and running about in soiled clothes. She said she used to wake up every night screaming before realizing her teeth were still there waiting in her gums. But by the time Sally was old enough to understand that story, old grandma was in dentures.

The seats in front of the main stage were filling quick with people by the time they arrived, mostly moms she recognized from PTA meetings, all there early to cheer on their own children who weren’t half as pretty as her Suzie. Heading on past the crowd to the back, the place for the ones who really mattered, Sally muttered a parade of hellos and nice-to-see-yous while her mind raced. What if, Sally thought, what if I kill some of them instead? It’d be better than killing Mike and Suzie, and then somebody, the police say, or a nice, kind citizen, could be a real hero and shoot me until all the brain and blood in my head comes dribbling out. A bit ahead she caught sight of Mike and Rachel sneaking back behind the curtain, both of them nothing but smiles. Maybe Mike will be the one to shoot me. She thought that’d be romantic in its own way.

Backstage had always been Sally’s favorite place in the whole fair, maybe even the whole world. Things felt different in that place normal people aren’t supposed to be. Back there, Sally felt like she was cut clean off from everyone else and yet closer to them at the same time, walking around along with all the tools and materials that made life what it is, like sneaking around in God’s supply closet. She liked the feeling of purpose in the air, the sense of belonging. If you’re here, she always believed, that means you’re needed.

Once they hit the line of girls waiting to go on, Sally was out of time and out of options. Suzie wasn’t smiling anymore. She could hardly blame her. Sally never forgot when she won. Nobody did. How happy her mother had been and how proud her father. It was the day she became somebody, and it was time for Suzie to do the same.

Tick, tick. One thirty. If only we hadn’t come. If only none of us had ever come to this stupid fair. If only the funnel cakes and the corn had been a world apart. The show started. Music blared and the line of children began to move, vanishing one by one into the light of the stage, curtains opening and shutting like some great mouth gobbling the kids up.

As they approached their turn, Sally squeezed Suzie’s shoulders and whispered, “Smile, smile, show the world your teeth, let them see your mouth, you’re a star, you’re a star,” while her eyes caught the thick rope used to pull open the curtain. There it was. The answer to her suffering. It was perfect. It’d fit around the neck just right, nice and cozy. Look, there’s already a little loop at the bottom made perfect for me. Pull those curtains open and send her flying up to hang above the pageant like an angel from heaven.

But then they were next and a nice young lady with big hair and a lanyard came up to Suzie while Mike showed up again with Rachel in tow and that big dumb grin of his plastered on his face, hand wrapped around Sally’s final hope, ready to pull the curtains open himself.

“Alright, you’re up next,” the woman said, bending down to meet Suzie where she was. Sally saw the scissors half exposed in her back pocket. ”How you feeling? Good? Nervous? Yeah, I bet.” Let go, let go, let go. ”So here’s how this works, it’s as simple as simple can be. I’ll count down and when I say ‘go’ I want you to run out there and do your thing, alright? Show everyone what you’re made of.“ Go away, go away, go away. ”Don’t worry, you’re nervous now but you’ll be fine. Once those lights hit and you’re on the stage, your whole world will melt away. Trust me.” Please, please, please. ”Ready?”

“You’ll do great, honey,” Mike said. “I know it.”

“Three, two, one. Go.”

A pull of the rope. The curtains rose.

Sally watched her daughter leave her side and run out onto the stage, music blaring so loud it shook the bones and people screaming ecstatic into a cacophony of noise and light and color. The rope was already in the sky. It was too late. It was all too late. It’d been too late from the very beginning. Oh God, Sally whispered to no one but herself. Oh God, I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. Forgive me. Forgive me. Please forgive me. The watch hands arrived at their destination. One thirty-eight. Time was up.

Her daughter was going to be a star.