Green Light, Yellow Light, Red Light

©2003 June M. Brautigan
All rights reserved.

The parsonage smelled like dead, wet leaves after a spring thaw. A couple of cocktail glasses and a cereal bowl covered with greasy dust sat on a Formica breakfast table. He looked around the place and poked in corners where sticky cobwebs webbed his fingers like see-through gloves.

The house looked the same except for the dust. Looked like no one lived here since he'd been gone. A door creaked behind him, echoing strangely loud off the dirty walls of the kitchen. He swung around to face the noise, half-expecting he'd see Mother digging in the freezer part of the old Frigidaire for some ice. He thought he heard ice clink in a glass and the whoosh of her sundress as she walked past him with a red lipstick smile. He could swear he saw her float up the staircase, her creamy white hand tinged with blood-red nail polish lightly dusting a trail up the over-varnished banister. He followed her up the stairs; sunlight streamed onto the landing as if a UFO were about to set down. She became fainter near the end of the hall; her body quivered like smoke from a blown-out match and vanished after she strolled under the doorframe leading to the master bedroom. A shaft of sunlight struck him square in the face from the doorway on his left, making fire leap from the depth of his brown iris and turning the white part of his eye translucent.

He stepped into the light and his old bedroom swallowed him. Both gulped, as if by taking each other in they became at once the same.

He became the boy again and opened the window, which stuck for an instant before it obliged and leaned out to hear horns, gravel crunch and buzzing of motors hoping to see a new Thunderbird below. He'd heard them talking once at State Hospital, when his mind cleared for a bit and they thought he couldn't hear them; they whispered to each other that they wished he could go home and try to remember. Remember what happened here two years ago; remember and then let it go. They said it would be cathartic and maybe help him let go of his crazy, sinister thoughts of the house.

He supposed they were right. If he were going to live here from now on, he should just relive the whole thing then forget about it.

He lay on his bed, still made up with King Tut sheets and hospital corners, like Father had shown him. Puffs of dust rose from the bedspread and scattered into the sunlight like tiny white fleas in a circus. He studied them, trying to hypnotize himself like they did at State Hospital when they wanted to pick his brain. He repeated one sentence over and over. "Show me my life two years ago." Slowly the surface of the walls began to hump and heave as if someone or something lived in the space between the lathes and plaster and was trying to get out. It finally burst through and the walls, transformed into a big screen movie complete with vivid Technicolor. It was a silent movie, but that was okay. The speaker was on full volume in his head...

"You need to go to the store," Mother mumbled past the crack of the door. She had slept late as usual and stumbled down the hall to rap on his bedroom doorframe. He could hear the tat-tat-tat of the dog clawing tiny scratch marks at the bottom of the door.

He wanted to watch TV, not run errands and fetch groceries. Sprawled across the bed's coarse coverlet, which was woven into a pattern of Egyptian-like gods in the form of jackals and birds and dog-men, he changed the channel on his Zenith with a Space Command wireless remote.

"You need to go to the store," she repeated.

"Yeah, I'm going," he said in a voice cracked by puberty.

He got up and pitched a gray, worn baseball at the wall. It splatted a hole in the plaster that sprouted spider-web cracks behind two posters nailed by each upper corner and center bottom. One poster splashed fire with red and yellow splendor while Clark Gable and Vivien Leigh embraced in a David O. Selznick production. Disney's Love Bug poster sprouted a flower growing out of Herbie the pink Volkswagen.

"Come on," she urged, "I'm out of coffee." The dog scratched at the doorframe like a terrier after some rat.

"Awright, I'm goin' ... I gotta get dressed first."

Bewitched was coming on. Why couldn't she be like Samantha and wiggle her nose for coffee? Or why not send the damn dog?

The dog was a nuisance. It claimed her lap and drew baby words and soft kisses from her lips. It tagged behind her wherever she went; down the hall, into the bedroom, and onto her bed. Someone from church had given her the small pet when she complained the house was too big and Father gone so often.

He pulled the door shut in her face, hoping to trap a paw and hear a yelp. If Father had been home he wouldn't have cared; probably would've snuck a grin at him if the Chihuahua whimpered. Father hated the spiky brown dog hair that littered the chaise lounge and Queen Anne chair arranged perfectly in the master bedroom. Hairs gathered nest-like in the seat of the gooseneck arm rocker he had given Mother for Valentine's Day and set near the window. She and the dog basked there in the sunlight as she crocheted fine slippers and mittens for the church fair.

Father vacuumed the house daily and wanted to dispose of the shedding Chihuahua like he had disposed of last year's birthday gift.

Chromed and oiled, it had worked perfectly. It had belonged to Father when he was young and he had saved it, hoping to have a son who would care for it, enshrine it. The two of them wound tracks through the living room, behind the sofa, around the black-and-white checkered armchair and underneath the coffee table. They laughed as Father placed crossing signs and square painted houses with white picket fences. The black locomotive tooted and changed tracks as it pulled flatbeds loaded with Lincoln Logs and Mother's teacup. It had sprawled across the living room floor like a slithering snake all year, until Father arrived home from work yesterday.

He started griping about everything: how he was going to be audited, something about misappropriation of church funds, and how Mother had pestered him all day with phone calls complaining the wiring in the house was short-circuiting. He tripped over the train on his way upstairs.

"I've been waiting to see if you have the ambition to pick up this mess," he yelled at his son. "Here it still sits on the filthy floor!"

Mother rushed into the room. "Why are you yelling?"

"You need to stop spending all your time at church socials and clean this house! And watch the boy!"

He stomped across the living room floor, bouncing dust bunnies hidden between plank crevices, and glared at his son. "You don't appreciate anything."

He bent down, gathered the locomotive and cars, wrapped them in Sunday's newspaper, and dropped them in a box. "I'll show you how to take care of things." He shoved open the screen door and carried the box to the locked barn.

"Don't worry," Mother whispered. "Maybe tomorrow morning we'll set it up before he gets home from work."

But the next morning she was up early. "My friend Anthony's taking me to the mall. I need a new dress," she told him as he walked her to the car. "The church fair is this weekend."

She kissed him near a tear. A smudge of passion red lipstick lingered on his cheek.

"He must have forgotten your birthday's on Sunday. I'll buy a gift; you can open it Monday and maybe we'll celebrate with ice cream and cake."

He paced for a while and then kicked the front door where it met the floor. "I thought 16 was supposed to be a big deal," he murmured, "sweet 16 and never been kissed."

The Ford Ranger Father used to take trash to the dump dared him from the driveway. He pulled down the visor of Father's blue cap as he drove the rattling, gas-smelling machine down the street.

Four blocks from home he was stopped for running a red light. The cop hurriedly wrote the ticket without asking to see his driver's license and practically threw it at him before racing off in his radio-squawking patrol car.

He stuck the ticket in his pocket while standing at the counter in Kettle's grocery mart, not realizing he'd been holding the thing pinched between his fingers while searching aisles for candy bars and chocolate milk.

He was back home before Father returned from work. The day turned dark; rain slashed diagonal strokes across the sky, spread tree limbs apart and filled the moat-like ditch surrounding the house with mud chunked runoff.

Streetlights snuffed out and electric in the house went dead. He helped Father carry the bulky generator up the stairs of the basement, his flashlight bobbing spirit-like ghosts off the cobwebbed ceiling. He attached two heavy-duty extension cords and at the end of one cord he plugged in the floor lamp and set it outside on the porch. The 75-watt bulb attracted white moths and mosquitoes while it illuminated the porch for Mother's late return.

Father scanned the dark streets while wiping greasy hands on his shirt. He ordered him to power the lamp upstairs so he could take a shower before Mother returned and the hot water tank turned cool.

He uncoiled the100-foot cord and dragged it up the stairs and through the hallway. He felt around the dark bathroom until he found the lamp cord and connected it into the power cord.

He took his time, stalling, defying Father's orders to hurry. He pulled back the plastic shower curtain and set the shadeless brass lamp in the crack where the tub met the wall. The bare bulb wobbled against the wall, making a ping-ping sound as his footsteps vibrated the sagging plank floor. He backed out of the bathroom and across the hall to his bedroom.

The bedroom sucked him in. The walls seemed to vibrate, excite him with an ethereal spirit. He listened for the droning spray from the showerhead and reached for the TV remote. He played with the useless buttons, wishing he could punish Father for forgetting about his birthday, and accidentally pushed the power button. Seconds later he heard the crash of the teetering lamp and the garbled scream and heavy thump of Father.

"Where is everyone?" Mother yelled from the bottom of the stairs.

"Don't come upstairs!" he yelled back."Father's had an accident. I heard him fall."

"What happened? Where's your father? What's wrong?" Mother shouted.

He sprinted down the stairs.

"Stay here," he demanded. "I'll call the ambulance."

The police said it was an unfortunate accident. He knew better; he knew the church would punish him for his sins.

Mother decided to have the funeral on Sunday. They had the wake at Father's church and she fixed hot chocolate and set out donuts to celebrate his birthday. That night he slept with her and she held him, crushing him close against her body, cradling his head on her soft chest.

The next morning she was smiling as she made flapjacks and sausage. She followed him from room to room, chatting about the upcoming school year and things she'd seen on the news. They played Monopoly and Chinese checkers for five days; she made cookies and elaborate meals of Swedish meatballs and chicken fricassee.

On the sixth morning, he dressed for court in one of Father's suits retrieved from the hall closet. He found her downstairs sitting at the kitchen table. He posed in front of her, turning to show all angles.

"That suit doesn't fit you properly," she slurred. "Why are you wearing a suit to traffic court?"

He ignored her remark and pulled out a chair; straddling it he faced her.

"Will you drive me to court, Mother?"

She eyed him as she sipped from a vodka- and tomato-coated glass. An ice cube dribbled past her lips and out the corner of her mouth.

"You know how I hate to drive and you look like a damn fool in that suit."

He pushed the chair too far back under the table, letting it topple to the floor. On his way out the door she shouted at him.

"Don't talk back to the judge and piss him off!"

He stood near the back of the courtroom, his back against the wall. When he heard his name called, he approached the bench.

Before the judge could speak, he dropped the crumpled ticket on the floor and jumped on it. He swayed back and forth like a suspended puppet and chanted in a thin, high voice:

"Green light, yellow light, ZAP there was no red light." He reached into his pocket and searched for the forgotten remote control. His index finger protruded from a frayed hole in the seam and he waved the stretched pocket and pointed finger at the judge.

"Are you threatening me?" the judge roared. "I don't want to hear your defense. I'm suspending your license for six weeks. If I see you here again, it'll be a long time before you drive."

He locked eyes with the judge and started to speak. The judge cut him off.

"Get out of here now. And quit acting like a lunatic!"

His cowboy boots squeaked as he ran past silent offenders. He raced through the parking lot inhaling and exhaling past his teeth, spitting spray like a blowing whale. He settled onto the oil-stained seat and chuckled aloud.

"How are they gonna suspend my license?" he asked the steering wheel. "I don't have one."

Still angry with Mother, he stayed hidden in his bedroom the rest of the morning, with the door locked and TV volume turned up.

"Mother!" he shouted. "Where's my lunch?" He waited for a reply.

"I'm hungry," he called out, peering past the bedroom door. He searched for her downstairs in the kitchen ... outdoors ... back upstairs where he found her in the bathroom. She was standing in front of the sink, draped in a white robe. The silk belt accentuated her small waist and the hem of the robe ended just above the knee, baring her shapely calves and ankles. She was studying her hair in the mirror, curling a few strands into ringlets to frame her pale face and wide full mouth.

"There's a show on TV," he announced. "One of those love stories you like so well. I saw the previews."

He stared in the mirror watching her fasten a new 22K gold cross necklace.

"We could watch it together," he pleaded. "Hey, I could drive to the store and buy some fresh strawberries. They're in season, you know. You could make us some strawberry daiquiris."

She didn't reply. She slid a pair of gold cross earrings into her earlobes and adjusted the two T's right-side-up.

"Come on," he said, "we'll have a good time."

"I don't want a drink," she announced. "Some of us from church are going out for lunch. Anthony is coming to pick me up. You remember him, don't you?"

"Sure I do. The one with a big smile that gave you your dopey dog."

She slipped past him and padded down the hall to her bedroom, goose-feather mules slapping against the soles of her feet. A ghostly wisp of talcum powder and lingering odor of Heaven Scent trailed her.

The whining Chihuahua hesitated before it tried to dart past him to join her, and he pinned it to the bathroom wall with the sharp toe of his boot. He scooped up the dog, hid it under his shirt, and stomped down the stairs and out the front door.

He threw the trembling pet down the porch steps and chased it into the street. The dog raced across traffic, dodging gravel-spitting tires without looking back.

He grabbed fliers and a letter from the insurance company from the mailbox and set them on the bureau in the foyer. He'd have to tell her the dog ran away. Slipped past him at the front door when he checked the mail. He'd tell her he saw someone snatch the pet and speed off in some unknown car. She'd be distraught. She'd need him. He'd have to hold her and let her cry....

She didn't cry at first. She went back upstairs into her bedroom and settled onto the gooseneck rocker. She picked up her needle and began to crochet; some tangled thing with no beginning or end. She worked quietly without speaking, but he could hear her whimper now and then and blow her nose.

Later Anthony came by and he told him she was sick. The silent house grew moody and dark; the night closed around him like a black tie constricting his blood supply. He stood at his bedroom window and watched headlights stop and go at the intersection. Toward dawn the sky turned neon green and spawned purple-black clouds that dumped infinite amounts of ice marbles onto the street. Fingers of jagged white fire snapped power lines and crumbled ceramic insulators. The metallic crunch of autos in the intersection sounded dull, like aluminum foil after it has been wadded and used again.

City workers tried to fix the signal light. In yellow hardhats, atop a cherry picker, they clipped the thick black wires with rubber-handled cutters and spliced them back together.

He waited until they finished and went outside to stand in the middle of the intersection to gather electric charges from the tumultuous air and wet, cool rain. He stretched out his arms, palms up, and gathered the currents, crushing the wormy pulses into his chest, rubbing them into his naked skin.

His bloodshot eyes elongated with the force of his stare as he tried to draw a charge into his enlarged pupils. He gulped the air as if trying to suck in the electricity licking at the traffic light.

"I have it figured out now," he said to the wind. "I will zap off all electric power. Every signal light on earth will stutter and blink, then die completely."

With a laugh he twirled on his toes. He beat his chest with his fists. "I can immobilize the world. Destroy all theme and convention. No-one will be able to drive without getting a traffic ticket or having an accident. From now on there will be no red lights in my world."

His hand slid down his wet naked hip. He fumbled front and back searching for a pocket. He pointed his dripping wet index finger at the traffic light. He needed his zapper, the black box upstairs near his TV.

Thunder boomed as if a great voice called his attention to the house. A heavy white shock pierced his eyes, darted through the empty space of his sinuses and bolted out the back of his neck between the first and second vertebrae. Another lightning bolt streaked toward the house and entered Mother's half-open window. It melted the crochet needle in her hand, ignited the tangle of yarn and burst the rocker into red and yellow flames. Mother dashed to and fro, firelight haloed her head and silk robe. The flame burned eagerly, consuming the fuel.

He wasn't sure the visions were helping him forget like the nurses had said. It didn't really matter; he didn't have anywhere else to live but here in the parsonage. Since the church had closed down, the place had been vacant the two years he'd been at State Hospital. The fire damage wasn't extensive; just in the master bedroom; he could fix that.

Maybe he could become a preacher like Father and reopen the church. The nurses at the hospital told him he could do anything; be anything once he got better. They said the lightning shock made him crazy, delusional; he used to rant on and on for days about how he killed his father and mother and how they had died for their sins. They told him it was nonsense and finally sent him home saying they helped him all they could; couldn't do anything more for him.

The walls flickered and turned static again as if electrons were bouncing across them like sunlit dust particles. He tried hard to think, hoping the visions would start again, but the walls became blank except for cracked plaster and occasional crumbling holes he'd punctured in childhood rages.

He'd read somewhere that you can never leave home. It stays in your psyche forever. He felt as if he belonged to the house; was in fact a part of it. He was imprisoned by the sins of 1,000 parishioners who had escaped from the church to collect in the walls of the parsonage.

"Sinners like to congregate," Father used to say, "but each alone will have to atone for their sins."

He wasn't afraid. He had already suffered; arose from it and he still had the power.

Maybe mother became imprisoned here; her sin of adultery locking her between the walls forever.

He reached for the remote on the nightstand and pressed the power button. The form of the Chihuahua appeared outside the bedroom door and barked; a shrill kind of insistence that brought footsteps down the hall exiting from the master bedroom.

She tapped on the doorframe and walked through the closed door as if it weren't there.

He caressed the smooth plastic case of the remote before he aimed and pressed the power button again. Mother sat down on the end of the bed, a fresh application of passion red lipstick on her smile. The bedroom walls began to hum as if electric power in the house had just turned on.

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