Wimbly'ssongclips

The following is an excerpt from the novel Wimbly’s Song, my MFA Thesis. I’ve included a substantial number of pages and by no means do I expect you to read all (or potentially any) of it. I have simply included it so that you might get a sense of it. Even though I’m starting you in chapter 3, it’s pretty easy to figure out the gist as you read. This portion is basically the set-up for the chaos that ensues in the second portion of the novel.

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So As Not To Go Home Again You see, the thing about Wimbly is that when he was a youth -- his pre Neville Sinclair days -- he cleaned garages for neighboring families. He loathed the work, but seemed oddly well suited for the job. Though quite lazy, he had an innate ability to organize even the largest mess. And, it was well known that once he commenced a task of organization, nothing could stop him until said task was complete. He was compelled to create perfection in every garage, sometimes turning a two stall garage into a three banger. This might have been Wimbly’s true calling, but that is not the reason for bringing it up. While it is true that, from the time he was an eighth grader through to his senior year, many families had Wimbly on semi-annual retainer, it was nothing compared to The Erickson family. The Ericksons had Wimbly on the equivalent of salary and, with it, their beck-and-call. It was typically to do garage work, at a handsome fee, for Mrs. Erickson, one or two times per month. Their garage it seemed, more than his own, was his. Wimbly had always, and to this day still considers, the Erickson garage to be one of the great masterworks of his life. Even among his novels, awards, and diplomas, the Erickson garage was a triumph for Wimbly, and he often shuddered to think of the state it was in, 15 years after his organizational genius graced it. He went as far as polishing the nails and sorting them down to head size and length. And, one would be mad to get him started on the “ingenious method” with which he hung the canoe and the couple’s bicycles -- “At once decorative, functional, and practical. And to think, done with only a few yards of tattered cord and some old skate wheels found deep within a sooty pail of toys.” However, the garage was, arguably, not Wimbly’s greatest feat at the Erickson home. He had, by the time the garage was at an all time organizational high he had only to lightly maintain on his Saturday

afternoon visits, grown aware that Carla Erickson had made it a routine to lay in a lawn chair in the driveway sun tanning while Wimbly toiled yards away, sipping on a bottomless glass of iced tea. This was routine well into the Fall when, despite the leaves turning and the weather growing crisp, Carla remained glued to the lawn chair, paging through the latest issue of The National Enquirer in nothing but her neon pink bikini. She would only rise to top off Wimbly’s iced tea and ask him if his back was sore and required a rub. The later of which Wimbly would longingly decline as he watched her saunter back to her chair, wondering if all women donned high heels while wearing bikinis. Yes, Carla Erickson was bold but, as she knew, so was Mr. Erickson, who spent inordinately long hours with the Duluth East High School softball team, whom he coached and mentored. Thus, it was without fail that Carla was left alone most Saturday afternoons as her husband went to coach many an away tournament. And, it was without fail that something in the garage would conveniently break or fall from its place on the wall. And, it was without fail that Wimbly would, one day, accept a back rub. This is precisely what Wimbly did on the morning of Saturday, September 4, 1981. Upon lifting a milk crate filled to the top with rusted bar bell plates -- an odd new addition to the garage -- Wimbly, not known for his physical prowess, fell to the ground exasperated, gripping his lower back. Carla, with the ferocity of a lioness on wounded prey, was there immediately to help him into the house, past three couches, and into her bedroom, shades drawn, and dimly lit save a candle. There she proceeded to give Wimbly the back rub of his lifetime. As she did the following week and the following, until the eve of his departure. Wimbly grew much during those weeks -- became a man one might say -- though the state of the Erickson’s garage suffered mightily. But the day Mr. Erickson, feeling ill or perhaps guilty, came home straightaway after softball, the sight of the spindly garage boy, hands tethered to a bedpost, blindfolded, mouth grasping a half peeled banana, and Carla, prancing in an Indian headdress was, perhaps, the last thing he expected. It was to be the final time Wimbly saw the garage of which he was most proud, and set into motion the process of Wimbly changing the rest of his name and leaving Duluth.

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Bastard Thus, Wimbly’s encounter at the outset of his third year teaching, with the name that shared a bit of his own was, in some ways, expected. For Wimbly had known -- he still had an acquaintance in the greater Duluth area -- that Carla Erickson and her greatly diminished husband had a boy shortly after Wimbly’s expulsion from their garage. Most thought it Mr. Erickson’s way of forgiving his wife’s obsession with the garage. However, upon the birth there was little doubt that the pasty-white child with a goofy grin and an odd affinity for organizing his toys was not, in fact, a product of Mr. Erickson; the darkest man in Duluth save “Chocolate” Chuck Campbell. Mr. Erickson, thus, fled to coach women’s softball in Canada, leaving Carla to raise her bastard alone. Wimbly, hearing with great frequency the effects of the unkempt garage from his Duluth confidant, never dared place a call to Carla and continued with his pursuit of a swift burial into the life of the English -a term he loved to think of as the subject which he taught as well as the culture which he sought -- academic. So he changed his name, and slipped by in college and, accordingly, graduate school. Eight years later he was a seemingly scholarly young man, ready to teach and write and lead the romantic lifestyle. With this, Wimbly had learned to fictionalize his previous existence to the point that he barley believed it real himself. It was merely a bad dream brought on by rotten liver at the previous night’s supper. That is, until he was appointed to assign the freshman liberal arts students into their introductory level literature seminars; one of which he was scheduled to teach. A random process really, with the emphasis on diversity of the sexes in each class, Wimbly came to the ‘E’s and gagged on his Mento as he read ERICKSON, MATTHEW WIMBLY. His self-imposed delirium about a life past was snapped like a wet string into the present; a taught reality if ever there was one. But, with nary a bobble aside from a few bulging beads of sweat, he allotted young master Erickson to another’s freshman seminar and moved to the ‘F’s. He noted that swift refusal of said name on his class lists for the next four years was the only sensible option.

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Wimbly was able to maintain avoidance with relative ease for the first couple of years. Never did he find the dreaded name on his class lists. In fact, he rarely saw it on any class list, for he kept a keen eye on English classes of any kind. Chalking it up to young Erickson not taking after his father’s interests, Wimbly became more confident about a simple four-year avoidance of the boy upon receiving word from his Duluth confidant that young Erickson hadn’t a clue that Wimbly was his father. The confidant, who Wimbly conjectured was now cleaning the Erickson garage, believed that it was a case of Carla being bored and wanting to unnerve Wimbly by sending the bastard to school right under his skyward nose. However, convinced that young Erickson, who appeared to be heading the route of an American Studies major, was not going to be a personal problem during his time at Cleaver Caldwell, Wimbly went on about his routine with relative security. Somewhere in the back of Wimbly’s mind was the unlikely scenario of an American Studies student falling blindly into a Wimbly Neville Sinclair taught class. A truly implausible situation, Wimbly sought comfort in the fact that only a slim number of actual English majors managed to find there way into his classes. Wimbly was, thus, safe holding court with the great British authors even if he himself was, perhaps, too lazy to actually do all of the reading he assigned. He had seen enough biographical television, and overheard enough opinion of those who had the audacity to actually read the books, to be able to, he fancied, teach a seminar to hungry minds. And, with regards to the authors he pretended to love particularly well, the James Joyces for example, he could simply teach comparative classes where he focused on something he knew from pop culture. The perfect way, Wimbly surmised, to sound like an expert was to create your own subject. However, as was the case with his Joyce’s influence on Hip-Hop seminar, sometimes his lazy ruse could turn tail and clomp him on the ass in the form of an American Studies elective too intriguing for a bastard to pass up. ## So Wimbly found himself, finally, semi-expectedly, staring half-hid face to half-hid face, with the ultimate reminder of his trophy garage. He had to admit, the chap looked sharp. He shrugged and ran his fingers through his hair because, really, Wimbly thought, how could he not end up handsome with such British seeming genes and an above-average, stilettoed mother to boot? However, at that very moment, holding the

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buttery class list and staring awestruck at young Erickson, Wimbly realized that he had procrastinated -- a trait deeply ingrained within him -on thinking, even earlier that very morning, about how he would deal with the situation if ever the two Wimblys met. Forced into action by the nature of the situation, he, with nearly 2 hours of class to fill, repositioned the pencil behind his ear, shuffled a stack of papers, cleared his throat, and blurred the back corner of the room. “First...ahem. First I will be passing out the syllabus. I want to note which of Joyce’s works we will be reading and the dates we will have each read by.” Wimbly’s tone strengthened. “There will be four papers and one presentation. Along with three random essay examinations.” Wimbly looked only at the syllabus. Slightly shaking, he moved behind the podium and sat upon a stool. He continued with his introduction, broadly going over the fictionalized yet sensible links between the works of Joyce, more so the shady underbelly of slum-infested, turn-of-the-century Dublin, and the culture of 1980’s Harlem. He discussed everything superficially, for that is all he knew. Had Wimbly known more was irrelevant because, even if he had, his mind was thoroughly confounded by his son.

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Given the Prominence of A Finely Stitched Attaché Eventually, blindly, and none too interestingly, the first meeting of the seminar ended with nary a peep from anyone. Wimbly had lulled the crowd, including young Erickson. As the stunned and potentially confused class left, Wimbly stood and gathered his affects, slack shouldered. Snapping the attaché closed he straightened himself and left the classroom expressionless. For Wimbly it was ritual to leave the first day of a class uncertain as to what was to come. It was not uncommon, as he strode back to his bomb shelter office, for Wimbly to wonder if, in fact, it would be the semester he was to be exposed as a fraud. He was infatuated with the notion of great literature and suckling the sweet marrow from every sentence of the world’s great prose. However, this was an unrealized notion, for Wimbly knew himself to be a man who, upon opening a regarded novel, became buried alive, totally

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helpless, claustrophobic to infinite degrees. He became trapped under the thick masses of words, sentences and paragraphs. They were written so carefully and brilliantly that he could not begin to fathom giving them their due. Consequently he would skim, maybe, the “greats,” suckling nothing. He kept at it though, the ruse, because somehow he could, and somehow he progressed, and somehow he knew he had something to bury beneath it. And, slowly, Wimbly bought into the surface of himself, seeing truth in what others saw, organizing his world accordingly. From his years of education, he understood that most take you on the surface as long as you’ve got just a bit more showing to back it up. And that’s what Wimbly had, just a bit more iceberg, bobbing lightly, to back up the textbook surface. On the rare, beer induced occasions when he would allow the thoughts beneath the Wimbly illusion to invade his thinking, he came to the conclusion that what made him such a quality bullshitter was his innate ability to organize a garage. To Wimbly a garage was the ultimate sign of one’s house, showcasing everything supposedly important in a person’s life. A person’s hobbies hanging on the wall and stored in shelves, coupled with their modes of transport, were the wrappings of what was, perhaps, inside the house. He always felt that one is lead to question a house with a remarkable exterior, but innards hidden to the passing neighbor. Wimbly would further surmise that if an immaculate house was sitting with its thoughtfully orchestrated garage open, in full view of thy critical neighbor, then the contents of the house must, logically, follow suit. And if the owner of the house never invited you all the way inside, it was acceptable because you had garnered an adequate preview from the garage where said owner sat smiling and arranging his tools. One could then be on their way, happy that their impression was a solid one. But, on this first day of class, it was not an uncertainty as to the tidiness of his garage that troubled Wimbly. Rather, it was the uncertainty of the young Erickson situation. Wimbly was so engulfed in thought that he failed to notice the young woman sprinting through the campus queue, with the directness of a well-aimed bullet. Stopping with a sharp, direct rap upon Wimbly’s shoulder, the woman wobbled slightly. Startled, Wimbly withdrew from his head, dropped the briefcase, and turned to see Estella Gordon-Pruitt IV.

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“Ah, bugger-cocks.” “Hi, Mr. Neville Sinclair!” Estella casually tightened grip on Wimbly’s rear and leaned in. “Wimb.” Wimbly stepped back and straightened himself. “Yes, Miss Gordon-Pruitt IV. Lovely to see you.” He adjusted stance and turned to leave. “I must be running along. Toodles.” Wimbly strode towards imagined asylum in Expat Hall, his conscious having been shifted from the Matthew Erickson pickle to the emergence of Gordon-Pruitt IV. Turning and looking over his shoulder after a few, lengthy strides, Wimbly saw the serenely smiling Gordon-Pruitt IV flanking him through the turf, completely negating the sidewalk. Her brown and white Mary-Jane’s moved her coffee pot frame with shocking fluidity over the uneven grass as she gained on him. Wimbly had reached a trembling gallop as he neared Expat Hall. He was all too aware that Gordon-Pruitt IV, whose left leg always carried a severe limp as though fake, was closing the gap with wobbly step. Alas, Expat Hall was near when Wimbly, catching Gordon-Pruitt IV’s incoming reflection in the flyer-covered door, doubled over, panting. With his office now at ankle height and behind a bike rack, Wimbly realized that, if Gordon-Pruitt IV were to corner him, broad daylight would arguably be the best forum. Thus, her shadow engulfing him, Wimbly raised his head, wiped sweat from his brow and stared, eyes quivering, into the face that turned his stomach more than England losing grasp of the colonies. “Ah, yes, Miss Gordon-Pruitt IV, what brings you along?” “Why did you just run from me Wimb?” Gordon-Pruitt IV tugged Wimbly’s sleeve. “Run? Why, I certainly did not run from you. I was simply attempting to break in a new pair of wing tips.” Wimbly, noticing his shoes to be badly scuffed and quite worn-in, set his briefcase down between them and Gordon-Pruitt IV. “Yes, and it seems to have worked swimmingly.” “Do you want me yet?” Gordon Pruitt IV, known for her alarming directness, fingered the red bow sewn into the front of her jumper and rubbed left Mary-Jane over right. Wimbly stumbled back and caught himself on a rusty Trek. His eyes darted. “Now, Miss Gordon-Pruitt IV, I seriously doubt that is an appropriate way to speak to your professor.”

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“Former professor.” Gordon-Pruitt IV grabbed the crotch of Wimbly’s trousers. Wimbly did an abrupt about face and placed both hands on the bike rack, formerly at his rear. “I really do not think that was appropriate Miss Gordon-Pruitt IV. Really not appropriate at all.” “All I am asking, Wimb, is if you want sex yet.” At that Wimbly paused, turned, paused again, snatched his briefcase and fled into Expat Hall. Estella Gordon-Pruitt IV strolled towards the bustle of students as though nothing of consequence had occurred. And, nothing of consequence, or at least out of the ordinary, had occurred, for an Estella Gordon-Pruitt IV and Wimbly Neville Sinclair confrontation was commonplace in the Cleaver Caldwell confines.

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Towards A Hermit Named Greg You see, the thing about Estella Gordon-Pruitt IV and Wimbly is that they had a history, though not what one might imagine. In a souring twist of fate, during Wimbly’s first day at Cleaver Caldwell, Matthew Wimbly Erickson was not the only name that caught his eye while assigning freshman into their introductory English courses. Just far enough down the list for Wimbly to have regained his composure, tea shot from his left nostril sending a piercing burn through his brain and down to his argyle socks, as he read a name he had seen before. To most, the name Estella Gordon-Pruitt IV was little more than another hyphenated, East Coast moniker. But to others, those in the know as Wimbly would have it, it was worlds more: three worlds in fact. The thing about Estella Gordon-Pruitt IV was that there were at least a trio of reasons why a common citizen with no ties to the Gordon-Pruitt family would have heard of her; or at least of her family. The first two reasons rested not so much with Estella herself as with the clans that united to produce that fine, hyphenated name, and fine, limping girl. Beginning with the more obscure bit of trivia, the Gordon name gained notoriety and wealth during the early 1960’s. It was then that Red Gordon -- full name Rosenthal Donald Gordon -- and his twin brother Green Gordon -- full name Gregory Westphall Gordon -- simultaneously vanished from their

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jobs at 3M and YKK Zipper respectively, only to resurface three years later in Chevy Chase, Maryland. Upon the reemergence of the brothers Gordon, who were not sorely missed, came their introduction of two products to the national stage: Fuzzy Sticky Tape and Steel Sliding Lightning. Fuzzy Sticky Tape functioned and looked exactly like Velcro, while Steel Sliding Lightning functioned and looked exactly like a zipper. In fact, years later, well after RedGreen INC had closed their Chevy Chase doors and the brothers Gordon had sank all their profits into a fledgling company begun by former company errand boy Bill Gates, it would be proven that Fuzzy Sticky Tape and Steel Sliding Lightening were duplicates of 3M’s Velcro and the YKK Zipper. However, little was done to prosecute, mainly due to sloth on the part of the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. Not only did this win the brothers Gordon infamy, money, and a permanent place within the annals of Trivial Pursuit, it won them twins of an equally notable name. ## Estella and Louise Pruitt were not known for their looks, though they were never informed of that. While the Pruitt twins were quite deviant, said deviance has nothing to do with why they became so notorious nationally and into portions of Canada. It was, in fact, an odd fondness for the 13th President, Millard Fillmore, that gave Wimbly, and many like him, their knowledge of the Pruitt name, and the sisters in turn. For most Millard Fillmore scholars, the name Pruitt signified the nefarious past that haunted the mediocre President. Yes, it was the Pruitt sisters’ greatgreat-grandmother, Estella Pruitt I, that had a decade long roll with an aging Millard, and ended up next to Abigail Powers Fillmore, at his death bed. There, at Millard’s side and in plain view of the visibly distracted Mrs. Fillmore, Pruitt I, their maid, lifted her smock and revealed a bulging stomach that had nothing to do with snacking upon the cake batter, but rather her tussles with Millard in the dimly lit barn while he recited The Bill of Rights. The bulge, which was met by exactly eight Millard tears, was to become Estella Pruitt II, Pruitt IV’s grandmother. The birth occurred only a few months after Millard, upon finishing his pudding, gargled, “The nourishment was palatable;” his last, haunting words. Estella Pruitt I, left repeating those words, mystified by their meaning. It was a meaning that mystified her until the day, while a special guest of Buffalo Bill at his Wild West Show, she was thrown to her demise from a bucking bronco. It was her 70th birthday.

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“The nourishment was palatable” became the rallying cry of the Pruitt women through the next three-fourths century, until Estella Pruitt III and Louise Pruitt decided to get to the bottom of Millard’s unwitting epitaph. An unauthorized and poorly penned memoir in the name of their bronco-bucked grandmother was the order. The book, A

Grandmother’s Indiscretions with Our Grandfather, the 13th President: The Palatability of the Maid in The Millard Fillmore Household, not only described in dime-store detail the Fillmore-Pruitt lust affair, but also made the scandal public knowledge for the first time. Until the book’s unwarranted success in the winter of 1962 -- a winter when public White House interest was at an all time high thanks to the playboy antics of the country’s Camelot President -- no one knew or, more precisely, cared, about the indiscretions or any other aspect of Millard Fillmore. It was because of the book, which Wimbly never read, though saw his mother reading while she reclined nude upon a bean bag chair one horrific day during the Summer of 1972, that he came to know the name Millard Fillmore. And, it was a flashback to the cover of that book while watching Jeopardy with his grad school roommate, Abdur Abduronovich, that led Wimbly to exclaim that the answer was “most certainly Millard Fillmore,” to Final Jeopardy upon only the topic, “The United States,” being posted. And it was the fact that Wimbly’s answer, pre-question mind you, was the correct one that led to his willingness to indulge in a TV program about Millard Fillmore, and also to pick up a copy of the Pruitt sisters’, by that time heavily banned, book. And it was all of this that combined to form his knowledge of the Pruitt name. ## Thus, when, on what proved to be a rather tumultuous afternoon, Wimbly came across the name of Estella Gordon-Pruitt IV on the class list, he suffered a momentary overload as a great bit of genuine knowledge simultaneously rushed to the surface at. He knew of both the Gordons and the Pruitts and, also, unrelatedly, the product of the two, Estella IV. It was a bona fide trifecta. However, the reasons for Wimbly assigning her to his freshman seminar had little to do with her parents, but rather, the phenomenal story that was Estella IV herself. Born of Gregory “Red” Westphall Gordon and Estella Pruitt III, Estella Gordon-Pruitt IV was their daughter by little more than blood. Tired of parenting by the time Estella IV was a toddler, they opted out of their day-to-day obligations by lending baby Estella IV to a secretive government education program

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founded by one of Red’s friends from Brushbriar Country and Racquet Club of East Chevy Chase. Former RedGreen INC executive Raymond J. Periwinkle accepted Estella IV and gave the Gordon-Pruitts a tidy tax write-off, which they used to buy a series of small islands off the coast of Greenland occupied only by sea lions and a hermit named Greg. This private sector to public sector hand-off of the rights to Estella IV (as the government labeled her) was beneficial for the Gordon-Pruitts, the government, Estella IV, and, as it turned out, The New Yorker, Harpers, and numerous other waspy periodicals. Said benefits arose because the particular education program to which Estella IV was “loaned” specialized in the cultivation, production, and marketing of young literary wunderkinds in order to promote a “dying literary awareness, which was leading to a lack of publishing profits.” As it was, by the age of 12, Estella IV was already being published in a wide range of media from Reader’s Digest to Time and, by the time she was 16, she was featured prominently on Oprah, where she was the primary resource for the development of Oprah’s book club. It was, thus, while watching the daytime tele that Wimbly first noticed Estella IV limping about Oprah’s stage, wearing a plaid jumper over a green turtleneck. She was oddly at ease as she discussed her latest article about the “most unfortunate decline of the Classics in academia,” before giving a glowing review to The Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood. An Oprah fan to begin with, Wimbly was instantly intrigued by Estella IV and, upon hearing the Gordon-Pruitt surname, felt his trivial worlds collide. Wimbly, as if beckoned by Churchill’s ghost, spent the better portion of an hour finding articles written by Estella IV, which he proceeded only to file away. He soon forgot about the girl, until her name crossed his desk.

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Flight of the Oddly Formless Wimbly was drooling. His head lie on his desk, and The Dubliners, pooling the spit, was creased open to page 17, with no signs of further creasing beyond. He was remarkably quiet, and if not for drool, one might have thought him dead. The drooling stopped, he smiled, and a small giggle began but was gargled down by more spit. At the window-well behind him, as the sun dimmed, a pair of Mary-Janes scuffled past the rusty bike rack.

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The door of Expat Hall creaked open and a series of steps, one soft, one thudding, drew closer to Wimbly’s door. There was a fragile knock, begging not to be heard, and the door opened to reveal Estella IV wearing a rather risqué jumper with nothing underneath besides freckles and the occasional mole. Wimbly didn’t so much as stop drooling and the Earl Grey continued to bubble on the hot plate. Estella IV moved to the side of the desk, drew the shades, and turned out the buzzing neon overhead. The moment the neon whir ceased Wimbly jolted up, sputtered, and fell backward, head hanging loose, mouth pointed at the ceiling. Estella IV dropped to the floor to hide. Wimbly had merely had a spastic sleep adjustment, typical for him during his office naps, usually caused by attempting to read a novel he was teaching. Estella IV, who had made sneaking in to spy on the leaking Wimbly, commonplace, knew this well, yet was always caught terribly off guard by it, and silently cursed herself as she pulled her frame from the ground. She looked in the same mirror Wimbly had used earlier that day as if to give her reflection a chance to beg out of the sleeping seduction to be. Her reflection merely smiled and watched as Estella IV produced purple lipstick from her lace fringed ankle stocking and applied it with the daft sloppiness of a rookie. She took one last moment at the mirror and then turned to Wimbly. His herringbone slacks were bunched up, his shirt was untucked, and his typically disheveled hair was oddly in place in a none-too-poetic way. Estella IV, who managed to truly know little about Wimbly, thought about how the Wimbly whom she was about to seduce, the sleeping one before her, looked like little more than a small town bumpkin dressed in costume. She felt badly for a moment, but the moment did not last as she moved to Wimbly’s side and slid her jumper to the floor with the thud of keys in the pocket. Wimbly slept on. Naked and somehow oddly formless, Estella IV swiveled Wimbly’s chair towards her and undid his belt and pants, not bothering with his shirt, jacket and bow tie; a combo which had long turned her on. She sighed and mumbled what sounded like “Oprah power” while she carefully pulled down Wimbly’s knickers. Bit by bit they slid off of his achingly white legs and to the floor. Estella IV paused for a moment at the slumped pants, knowing Wimbly detested wrinkled trousers. It was no matter as she was fairly certain that Wimbly would detest, quite a bit more, what she was about to do to his helpless presence. Her focus shifted to the white boxers, emblazoned with his

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initials and the postscript Ph.D. They appeared to be as neatly pressed and starched as the trousers themselves. Estella IV was admiring Wimbly’s undergarments when she noticed that a certain palpable muscle was awakening from slumber beneath them. At the sight she nearly choked on her perpetual piece of Bubbleicious, and her knees began to sweat. It was a moment Estella IV had imagined since she had discovered Wimbly’s doctoral dissertation on the causal relationship of the work of Evelyn Waugh to the birth of MTV, while researching an article for the Atlantic Monthly when she was 16 and, thus, decided that she must go against the government’s wishes for her continued education at Harvard, and attend Cleaver Caldwell, a small step up from community college, instead. Owing to the fact that it was a transcendent experience when she first laid lips to Wimbly two years prior, Estella IV assumed that the consummation of their relationship, albeit unwilling for one party, would be the culmination of her unusual being; truly something to write mom or, in her case, Oprah, about. Trembling, she slid the shorts down Wimbly’s waist and over his yawning midsection, as Wimbly himself remained fast asleep, pooling drool. Focused on getting the shorts off without waking her sleeping assistant professor, Estella IV paid no mind to the lively teapot behind her. At last, the under shorts slid to the floor and crumpled on top of the trousers; neither beyond Wimbly’s shoes. Wanting to take the moment of grand unveiling in all at once, Estella IV had closed her eyes so as not to ruin the surprise, and, when she opened them, surprised she was. In place of the boxers, just above his manhood, was something amazing and, in this case, disturbing. Above the hairline protruded a spot the size of a shilling. It was, at its most common, just a birthmark but, when one looked closely, it was not any commonplace, haphazard splotch. It was, in fact, an exact likeness of the 13th President, Millard Fillmore. Odder still, she had seen this very birthmark before. Estella IV’s mouth went dry and she stumbled back a step or two, maybe three. Her left foot caught Wimbly’s trousers and she fell backwards, catching herself on the scalding edge of the hot plate. However, simultaneously with her hand arriving, the whirring tea reached a climactic boil and emitted the shriek that Estella IV would have had she completed her original task. Whatever the origin of the shriek, the commotion had, at last, woken Wimbly, who attempted a frantic rise from his seat, sending drool into his left eye as the pants at his ankles knocked

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him back over the chair, and into the bookshelf. Wimbly was left, legs to the sky, buried amongst a stack of unread novels; novels which he knew would one day come back to haunt him. From on the floor, half naked and covered in drool, a thoroughly baffled Wimbly made out a jumper being snatched up, and a bare form fleeing in a chaotic limp. As the door closed, Wimbly noticed that the tea was done.

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The Lexicon of Desire Estella IV needed sex, she craved it. Perhaps it was a side effect of the sterile government environment in which she was raised or, more likely, it was due to a certain Senator’s overly keen interest in the program in which Estella IV was involved. Whatever the reason for it, she was gunning for a roll when she arrived on the Cleaver Caldwell campus her freshman year. She figured that she’d be able to bed the reason for her presence, Wimbly Neville Sinclair, with relative ease and tire of him just as her four years at said institution of mediocrity were up. What she did not count on, however, was Wimbly suffering from an odd form of lingering posttraumatic shock brought on by an incident in his youth. It seems, much as Estella IV’s encounters with the Senator had led to her becoming a dynamo always in the mood for a roll, Wimbly’s encounters with old Carla Erickson had caused him to swear off such activities altogether. Upon learning of his adamant refusal of her body, Estella IV became certain that she would not be able to idly pass her college years having only a PG-13 semi-affair with her professor. Thus, she setout to find an outlet for her daily needs. Ideally, she had wanted someone to unconditionally materialize at her side when and where she wanted, yet unconditionally let it stop there. What she needed, then, was someone with whom to indulge her body, while she worked on Wimbly to indulge her mind. The destined someone was a boy she had met in an American Studies elective of her first semester; Matthew Wimbly Erickson. The strangest aspect of the situation was that Estella IV had no idea that Matty Erickson was related to Wimbly, which could also be said for Matty himself, who was sent to Cleaver Caldwell, mind you, by his mother. Thus, it was simply blind luck that brought Matty and Estella IV together for an American

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Studies project nary a day after Estella IV had decided that she must abandon her plan for an easy conquest of Wimbly. The project -- to create a dramatic dialogue between Thomas and Mrs. Jefferson over his supposed fling with the help -- brought the pair together at a moment when Estella was for the taking. Matty was more than happy to take, and did so with alarming regularity throughout the next couple of years. He never questioned why they hardly ever spoke, nor wondered why it was that Estella IV spent such a large amount of time hanging around Expat Hall and that gangly, Canadian looking professor, who often walked like he had soiled his knickers. Matty Erickson never questioned a thing, that is, until, while climbing a pine tree shirtless, on a dare from some classmates, he noticed the gangly assistant professor peeping around the corner of an old water heater. As the assistant professor peered around the corner, sap began to stick to Matty’s oversized nipples. He scolded the tree and took note of the assistant professor, now attempting to hide beneath his briefcase. Chalking it up to some type of odd, pre-class ritual, Matty was about to make his way back down the tree, when he noticed his wobbly girl creep around the other side of water heater. More sap oozed onto his chest, but his eyes were now fixed on Estella IV. As she neared, the assistant professor quickly stood, brushed off his plaid suit, straightened his bow tie, and acted as though he were not, just moments before, hiding. Matty found it odd that Estella IV would, or even could with that limp, sneak up on anybody. The conversation seemed awkward and headed nowhere so Matty decided to head down the tree in hopes of catching Estella IV for an afternoon bath. However, as he was passing the broken branch which Henry -- Matty’s friend who had attempted to scale the tree just moments before him -- had toppled from, Matty noticed Estella IV inching closer to the assistant professor who attempted to edge away and, while doing so, tripped over a valve and fell into the bushes. An odd feeling seized him as Estella IV wasted no time in pouncing on the downed scholar and making an effort to tear his suit off. The assistant professor managed to roll through the bushes, out of her clutches, grab his briefcase and flee with Estella IV close behind. Matty’s heart raced and his mouth watered as his hands began to moisten. This caused a slick reaction with the sap that had, until that point, been a useful adhesive of body to tree. Matty went down hard.

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Until that afternoon of sticky chested heartache Matty had never considered that Estella IV, who spent next to no actual quality time with him, could have feelings towards other men. Typically a jealous person, upon picking himself off the Cleaver Caldwell lawn with no more than a sprained index finger and sore coccyx, Matty felt at ease with the situation, figuring that there was no way Estella IV could have been with anyone else due to the great frequency of their encounters. This explanation, potential self-medication really, was an adequate tool for staving off the vile jealousy one might expect. However, as Matty walked home, oddly content and contemplating his next encounter with Estella IV, he noticed the man Estella IV may or may not have attacked before his very eyes, confidently straightening his suit, messing his hair, and placing a #2 pencil behind his ear. Estella IV was nowhere to be seen, yet, for some reason, seeing the assistant professor vainly struggling to perfect his look in the window’s reflection blasted Matty’s formerly reassured self. Matty felt that the assistant professor was not so much adjusting his appearance because of an obsessive compulsion to do so, but rather as a smug gesture to be thrown in Matty’s face. Upon finishing in the window and pausing to double check three times, the assistant professor moved across campus as though Churchill parading triumphant through London. Matty was left to stare at himself in the reflection. Scratched and syruped, Matty was disappointed with his appearance and was growing ever more disturbed by Estella IV’s potential indiscretions. That evening Matty was visibly frustrated as he and Estella IV tussled in a portion of the library which was closed due to a fire earlier in the semester. Estella IV took little notice however, as she concentrated on the thought of Wimbly. When she would pay attention Estella IV would usually focus on Matty’s midsection where there was a perfect image of her biological great-great-great grandfather’s profile in the form of a birthmark. Estella IV had never mentioned the birthmark to Matty, though one time, early in their fling, Matty awkwardly noted that she should not be afraid of the mark near his crotch, which looked “like Marky Mark.” That day amongst the ash, Matty could, perhaps for the first time, see that Estella IV was absent while they consummated. And, despite his audible calls for her attention that evening, she did not snap out of her trance until she finished and left Matty lying among the cinders, crying.

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That evening, as Matty was about to confirm his American Studies course load, an image of the gangly assistant professor materialized. Matty, thus, opened the faculty web page and scrolled through yearbook quality head shots until he came to the curly auburn locks. Matty clicked on the picture and was directed to the web page of Wimbly Neville Sinclair, assistant professor of English. The page was “under construction,” but noted that a comprehensive list of “awards, accolades, fellowships, grants, published works, and famous chums” was to appear soon. Matty clicked to the registration page and typed Wimbly’s name. One class arose for the following semester, Eng 328: James Joyce’s Influence

on the Hip-Hop Culture of 1980’s Harlem; a perfect American Studies elective.

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Danielle Steel and Desolation So it was that Wimbly found himself mostly naked on the floor of his office, torn between fury and wondering if Estella IV noticed the monogram on his boxers. As he pulled his trousers up, he pondered the odd turn the day had taken. Just one afternoon previous Wimbly had been peacefully sitting on the couch admiring his reading chair and imagining which book he would fail to read next, as the E! True Hollywood Story of Danielle Steel did little to capture his full attention. While pouring a cup of Earl Grey, he reassured himself that Matthew Erickson could not possibly know who he actually was, and that, perhaps, Estella IV had not really been attempting to seduce his sleeping self, but rather, had merely desired to compare tan lines attained during summer holiday. Wimbly walked to the mirror and stared at himself. Routinely he jutted his chin, messed his hair, checked his profile, and straightened his tie. Once satisfied, he suited-up in his riding gear and left for the evening. As he exited Expat Hall, the sun was going down and the campus was growing desolate. Disappointed there was nobody to watch him depart, he walked slightly hunched over, to his motorcycle. He strapped the briefcase down, kicked the Enfield to a start, and rode home, scarf tails whipping, lonely.

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10

Dickensian Slander and Auspicious Tidings The clanging of Wimbly’s alarm clock did not wake him, but rather it was God Save the Queen blaring from his cellular phone in the kitchen. He cursed the fact that someone would be calling him at 6 a.m. and let the distant ringing cease. He waited for a moment, and, upon hearing no more, closed his eyes for 36 more minutes of slumber. It was not to be, however, as God Save the Queen again blared and sent Dickens into a nipping frenzy. Defeated, Wimbly turned the quilt to the side and sat. His flannel pajama top was off by one button causing the right side to hang just lower than the left as he stepped into the slippers tucked neatly next to the bed and stood. He ignored Dickens as he grabbed his robe and proceeded, to his cellular. With a yawn, Wimbly flipped the phone open to a panicked Estella IV. Wimbly had not seen or heard from her since the awkward episode of two days prior, which he had nearly managed to repress with low-grade liquor and Mad-Libs. However, as Estella IV continued with the spastic jabber of a humming bird trapped in an outhouse, Wimbly’s palms went clammy and his focus shifted to that day’s class; his second with Matthew Wimbly Erickson. Getting through the first session was not pleasant, and his natural pessimism began to prevail as the hour of session two drew near. The warmth of Dickens’s urine upon his foot snapped Wimbly back into the moment and, just before he reprimanded the pooch, he heard Estella IV mention something about his birthmark as she hung with a furious beep. Puzzled and covered in pee, Wimbly was left staring at his birthmark. Less than an hour later, Wimbly buzzed back through the arch, scarf faithfully flowing behind. A cup of Earl Grey tea, a cold shower, and a therapeutic moment of scolding Dickens was enough to prepare him for what he hoped to be a typical day. As he dismounted the Enfield, his tan linen suit relaxed into a perfect crease and his red bow tie remained firmly knotted. It was a rare flawless dismount from the cramped confines of his Enfield, and surely an omen of good things to come. As Wimbly removed his goggles, his face brightened at the softness of his hair. He pushed it back to its desired position, where it never stayed, yet it did perfectly. People moved aside for him and, halfway to Expat Hall, the band, practicing in the courtyard, stopped playing Twisted Sister’s We’re

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Not Gonna Take It and started up with a winning rendition of God Save the Queen. A tear came to Wimbly’s eye as he continued his march to Expat Hall, increasingly sure that it was to be a great day on campus. Perhaps it was the tear, or maybe his blindingly good start, but he did not notice Estella IV standing, eyes red and hair in a snarl, at the entrance of Fritz Freudenhoffer Freshman Dormitory, watching Wimbly with malice. As Wimbly got to the door of Expat Hall, Warren G. Warren, Dean of Cleaver Caldwell and former Texas Ranger, was exiting. He held the door open for Wimbly while praising his suit and punctuality.

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How One Tastes Liver The rest of the morning was a blur of good fortune, as word of a publishing deal for a book he had not yet written was received, and the news that Tim Henman, Wimbly’s favorite tennis star, had overcome a knee injury and would play at Wimbledon in its next go around, was relayed. By the time he entered class, Wimbly needn’t even check a mirror to place his askew pencil owing to confidence that it was perfect by virtue that all had been that morning. Crystal clear were Wimbly’s thoughts as he systematically unpacked his briefcase and scanned the room. Whilst opening his mouth to begin, and with nary an avoidant glance in Matthew Wimbly Erickson’s direction, Wimbly kicked his mug of Earl Grey, which he had sat, for some confounding reason, at the base of the podium, over onto his left foot. The lukewarm tea seeping into Wimbly’s loafer shocked his mind back to the morning’s urine incident. It occurred to Wimbly then, just moments before what was surely to be his best lecture ever, that, other than Dickens lifting leg on Wimbly’s foot, the morning had gone strikingly opposite of the way his mornings usually began. And, as he attempted to shift attention from his wet loafer and downed mug, he realized that class went best when his mornings went worst. It was, he surmised, some Zen like way of making things find their center. However, he gave it little more thought than that. Only partially as a result of the tea soaking through his argyle stocking, Wimbly’s high from the morning’s fortunes fled by way of large globules of sweat. Plop, plop they fell to the podium as the class stared in bemused disgust, and Wimbly awoke to the negative ramifications that a good morning would

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surely have on class. If Wimbly had learned anything from watching celebrity biography shows, it was that good always came with bad. It was, thus, that Wimbly felt that the sanctity of his garage was in jeopardy. And, when, upon pulling hanky from lapel and wiping his brow, Wimbly noticed the bloodshot eyes of Estella IV at the open door, his customary dull groan was all he could muster. Paralyzed by the moment Wimbly proceeded to do the only thing that made sense to him at the time; pick up his mug from its puddle at polish it clean with his teary-eyed hanky. When Estella IV entered the room, it was not Wimbly she turned to. Rather, when Wimbly, flinching, raised his eyes from the mug, he saw Estella IV cornering Matthew who stood motionless, next to the desk of a plump girl drinking a Diet Rite through a twisty straw. The entire class, oddly in tune with the situation, hushed, and one boy, directly behind Estella IV, switched desks to attain a better view. As Estella IV moved closer to Matthew, Wimbly simply felt like napping. After a long moment of suspenseful fumbling, and just as some in the class were losing interest, Estella IV’s hand thrust from her bag clutching a photo copy of a painting. “Do you know what this is, Matty?” Estella IV broke the silence. “A photocopy.” “Of what, Matty? A copy of what?” Wimbly entertained the thought of snatching his briefcase and exiting class. “Of a painting.” “A painting of what?” Estella IV tapped the copy. “Of some balding old guy with really rosy cheeks.” Wimbly grabbed the briefcase to depart. “Its a picture of my great-great-great grandfather.” At this turn, and against his better judgment, Wimbly decided to stay and leaned against the podium. “Huh.” Matty grabbed the copy. “You recognize it from anywhere?” “Nope.” Matty growing annoyed. “Nowhere?” Estella IV motioned to Matty’s crotch; an eyebrow raising move. “You’ve never seen this anywhere?” “No. Would I have? I mean, is he famous?”

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“Yes, you would have. And yes, he is famous, but you would have seen him somewhere else alot more often.” Estella IV looked to Matty’s crotch again. “What? Does he live around here or something?” Matty grabbed the picture. “What’s his name?” “Ain’t that Grover Cleveland, yo?” A squatty kid wearing a basketball uniform and a cowboy hat joined in. “NO!” Estella IV shot the kid an offended glance. “It’s Millard Fillmore.” “Oh, hell yeah. Dat’s right.” The kid leaned back in his chair. “Your relative was an oil tycoon?” Matty appeared intrigued. “No, Matty, my great-great-great grandfather was the thirteenth President of the United States.” Estella IV was at once angry at Matty and proud her heritage. “So then why isn’t your name Fillmore?” “It’s a long story which involves Presidential indiscretions and illegitimate child-rearing. Anyhow, that’s not the point.” “So what is?” Matty warmed to the public confrontation in which he found himself. “The point is, Matty, that you have a birthmark that is the spitting image of Millard Fillmore -- more precisely, Millard Fillmore’s profile -on your crotch.” For the first time Estella IV looked towards Wimbly, his hands shooting to his groin. “What! You seen that dude’s crotch? You can do way betta’ dan dat yo!” “Not the point.” Estella IV shot cowboy hat guy a quick wink, then stared Matty down. “You mean my birthmark in the shape of Marky Mark?” “It doesn’t look anything like Marky Mark, Matty. It looks just like Millard Fillmore. Exactly. Compare.” Estella IV snapped the elastic waistband on Matty’s wind pants. Matty peered down them. The plump girl behind him attempted to garner a peek as well, but was wedged into her desk and could not move, though her Diet Rite, thankfully near gone, tipped over as a result of her efforts. “Huh. It does kinda look like that guy.” “Yeah it does, and it’s always really weirded me out.” Estella IV continued to stare only at Wimbly. “But then the other day it blew my mind.”

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“You mean when I did that new thing?” “NO! I mean something happened the other day that was so completely out of the blue that I can’t even understand it.” Estella IV moved to the front, towards Wimbly who, now facing the tornado that would surely tear his pristine garage down, cowered. “Matty, what do you know about your professor?” Estella IV stood over Wimbly who sat Indian style beneath the chalkboard. “All I know is that the other day I saw you trying to attack him.” “How did you see that?” Estella IV and Wimbly said in unison. “I was way up in a tree and I saw you trying to get him. It was really weird.” “Why the hell were you in a...Whatever...But you know nothing else about him? Nothing at all? Whatsoever?” Estella IV looked at Matty with an odd curiosity. “Uh-uh. Nothin'.” “Nothing at all? Not a single thing? You have no connection to him in anyway?” Estella IV grabbed Wimbly’s lapel and dragged him from the podium. “The lad has said he knows nothing about me whatsoever, nor should he, and I think that you should probably stop this tirade about presidents and birthmarks right now, Miss, uh, Gordon-Pruitt is it?” Wimbly attempted a futile attempt to harness the situation. “Shush, Wimbly!” Estella IV grabbed Wimbly’s lips. “Answer the question, Matty.” “Well, I mean, I guess I’m in his class...But that’s mostly because I was angry about seein’ you two.” “So why did you come to school here at Cleaver Caldwell, anyhow?” “My mom wanted me to come here really bad for some reason. Said it was where a kid like me was destined to go.” “Well, Matty, just so you know, Assistant Professor Neville Sinclair -- his first name is Wimbly, eh hem, like your middle name -- has got the same exact birthmark in the same exact place.” “Whoa, what! You seen dis dudes crotch too? Damn girl, what up wit dat!” “Yes. Only once and, in all fairness to him, he was napping and unaware.” Estella IV looked apologetically to Wimbly. “What! Why would...I mean...What tha? I totally don’t--” Matty was confused to the point of incoherence.

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“Assistant Professor Sinclair, Wimbly, I’ve always meant to ask you.” Estella shifted focus. “Where did you grow up?” “Ah yes, well, that is a long story, Miss...Gordon-Pruitt IV.” Wimbly rose in one last desperate attempt at salvation. “You see I was orphaned in the Serengeti as a wee tike and left to be raised amongst the indigenous peoples of the area when an English doctor and his American schoolteacher bride-to-be came through my village on safari and decided to adopt me as their own. From then on my life was a series of far reaching worldly adventures, while being privately schooled by my mother before being shipped-off to university at the age of 16, and now, alas, I find myself here, in this classroom, in the midst of a rather curious, and somewhat embarrassing, situation.” “Hmmm. When I was researching you I could’ve sworn records of Wimbly Neville Sinclair only date back to the time you were 16...It’s really strange that I couldn’t find anything else about you if you’ve led such a fantastic life.” Estella IV took the podium. “Well, yes, ummm, that is odd, but I guess that can be explained by the way I came to be.” “You know, the same day I was researching I found some interesting newspaper clippings from the Duluth Herald-Tribune about a boy named Matthew Scott Johnson. He changed his name to Wimbly.” Estella IV flicked a wry smile at Wimbly. “Well, it is quite a lovely name.” “The article was about how good that kid was at cleaning garages.” “Hmmm, you don’t say. Shows what kind of rinky-dink events are newsworthy in a tiny, where is it, Georgia?, town.” Wimbly himself was baffled by his attempts to play the situation off. “The kid in the picture looked really familiar.” Estella IV turned towards Matty. “He actually looked alot like you, Matty.” “Huh?” Matty was desperately lame to the situation at hand. “Actually, Matty, I think it was a picture of this Wimbly right here.” Estella IV grabbed Wimbly’s trembling shoulder. “You sure you’re not from Duluth, eh hem, Minnesota, Wimbly?” “It might be a possibility…I mean, with the traveling and the adventures and…” Wimbly blubbered to quiet. “Whoa! Whoa, whoa, whoa. What is going on here?” Matty was desperate.

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“Matty, do you know who your dad is?” Estella IV switched approaches as she looked from Matty to Wimbly. “Mom just keeps sayin' it’s a sperm donor or something like that. I’ve never really bought it though. I mean…” Matty trailed off. For an instant Wimbly had the desire to tell the bastard that he was, in fact, his father. That desire for truth, as with most of Wimbly’s desires at truth, passed, however. “Matty, its Wimbly!” Estella IV was exasperated. “What is Wimbly?” “Yo dad, fool! Dat dude is yo pops, kid! Whoa, SNAP!” The kid spiked his cowboy hat into the ground. “What? No way. There is no way that’s possible.” Matty cringed as he looked at the cowering Wimbly. “Wimbly’s your dad, Matty. It is what it is.” Estella IV inhabited a tone of surprising compassion. Wimbly had inched his way back to the front of the room. He was standing behind the podium as though about to begin his lecture. He took a sip out of his empty mug and adjusted his jacket. His face was solemn, and a solitary tear welled at the corner of his eye. In lieu of speech he picked up his briefcase, and proceeded out of the classroom. As he left, his shoulders were hunched, his head bobbed, and his fine linen suit bagged. He figured to look distinctly un-British exiting the classroom that day. He moped to the Enfield, abandoned his briefcase, and fled.

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Steel Fleeing Lightning & Inevitable Chance It was but a short flight. Upon ripping through the arches and nearly dropping into an oil-slicked tailspin, Wimbly’s steadfast Enfield, sputtered to a famished nap a mere shuttlecock’s back kick from campus. The woodwinds accompanied by a lonely trumpet playing A Boy Named Sue could faintly be heard. His noggin slunk to rest on the down turned handlebars and the gas gauge, badly in need of refurbishing. His breath was heavy and his face sallow. For a moment Wimbly remained steady, straddling cycle, absorbing the hideous occurrence of a few moments previous. A picture, as though from a high school yearbook, floated through his mind; a kid with a side-

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spike haircut and some odd form of a mullet, whose shirt contained a handprint and whose jeans were washed to a stoned hew. At that his body snapped back to attention and he vied for one, hulking, seam stressing kick start, but, alas, it was not to be as he was left with little more than newly split trousers. “Blasted bastard!” He jumped off and threw the Enfield to the soft shoulder, sending a wisp of dust into his face. “Fucking lame bugger! Ludicrous hunk of steel! By Cornwallis’s ghost I’m gonna bloody...” Wimbly paused, unsure whether a motorcycle was made of steel, and feeling slightly regretful at the slough of insults he’d begun to hurl at his mighty, military machine. The polished green and black of the bike was covered with dust. As he lifted it, Wimbly winced at the thought of the downtrodden state of the side that had thoughtlessly kissed the ragged gravel. Once upright, with kick stand firmly in place, Wimbly was both pleased to find nary a dent, and sickened by the sight of the gas tank riddled with light scratches. As if on instinct, as he stood disheveled on road’s edge, having only moments previous fled his life’s work, Wimbly snapped hanky from lapel and began to spit shine the Enfield. Pleased with the aesthetic improvement a little spit provided, Wimbly’s spirits began to lift as he shined. However, upon reaching the ‘Enfield’ inscription his twirling finger encountered uneven terrain. Wetting his finger and rubbing the area in question, exposed a deep, serpentine gouge, which ran from the top of the ‘E’ down around the majority of “Enfield” where it cut back and down, in lightning jaggedness, rendering the cycle’s proud model number illegible. Wimbly was disgusted with the bike-maiming crevasse. It took every bit of his good sense to restrain himself from heaving the bike back to the gravel. The same restraint was not, however, used with the tear welling up in his right eye. Possibly from the state of his bike, possibly from his lecture that was not to be, or possibly from the dust suspended in the humid air, the tear at Wimbly’s eye gave-way and, when it did, rolling solitary down his face, its loneliness proved to be short-lived as floods released. With soiled hanky, Wimbly was rendered defenseless to the salty onslaught. However, he chose to ignore it and, occasionally using tears to his advantage, continued to clean his bike.

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You see, for Wimbly, at that moment, on that day, he really had no other choice. He needed desperately to do something and, since a presumed lack of gas precluded his fleeing, it seemed appropriate to clean while he gathered his thoughts and waited for the tears to cease. However, every time they dried, more dust would invade his eyes and tears would begin anew. It was a vicious cycle and Wimbly silently cursed his glands, while remaining steadfastly engulfed in polishing the Enfield. Although the bike had been buffed back to near mint condition, Wimbly took off his jacket and rolled up his sleeves in preparation for some undercarriage work, but was disrupted by the sound of a smooth British engine. He glanced up just as a cherry red Aston Martin sped from the Cleaver Caldwell faculty lot with a glint and sparkle of the fender. Wimbly noticed what looked to be a leather suitcase strapped to the luggage rack on the trunk -- a move he surmised to be for style -- as the car ripped in the opposite direction. “Who in blazes was that?” Wimbly stood in silence, gazing towards the vanishing car. “Magnificent. Really quite splendid. But tell me, really, who was he to be pulling out of our faculty lot?” Manned by an armed attendant, the faculty lot, adjacent to, yet four feet higher than, the common lot, was only ten spaces and, despite local authority protests, included nary a handicap slot. Made of smooth concrete and donning bronze name placards for the bearer of each space, the faculty lot was an elite club, which all Cleaver Caldwell faculty vied for, yet was only re-slotted upon death, retirement, or fatally crossing Dean Warren G. Warren. Wimbly, however, had long argued that, despite his name being buried deep within the waiting list, he was entitled to a spot because he rode a motorcycle. A sound argument really, at least once a semester Wimbly would approach Dean Warren, with a blueprint that illustrated how, if they were to eliminate a coin operated vacuum cleaner next to Professor Languine Carney-Hestelabonanzo’s space, it would create a perfectly sized slot for the Enfield; and, since he was “the only member of [their] distinguished staff who traveled hither and thither via motorized bicycle,” the space should be his. Seeing as the vacuum had not worked since Professor Carney-Hestelabonanzo had mortally jammed it upon sucking up a Cadbury Cream Egg and a box of Marshmallow Peeps from her sedan four Easters previous, Wimbly was shocked and a bit offended when, at each request, Dean Warren would deny him the spot

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with a condescending chuckle and a pat on the head. So the sight of a car which was not one of the prestigious ten, exiting the lot, was no pittance to Wimbly. He re-jacketed himself, abandoning the undercarriage cleansing, and, with no other choice and the strange auto gripping his thoughts, pushed the Enfield back to campus. Wimbly was grateful that no cars passed, as frightful and indigent as he feared he looked; greasy and disheveled, grunting as though returning serve, with each heave of the cycle. At last, in what seemed an eternity, Wimbly passed through the arch, though he cursed his watch and lack of stamina as he realized the elapsed time of the trek to be only 8 minutes. He was not to dwell too long on the grueling minutes, for, he realized, it had been nary an hour since he fled class. In fact, his class was still supposed to be in session. The impulse to flee remained. What he surmised to be his sense of noble duty but amounted to little more than a broke cycle and a jealous curiosity at the state of the faculty lot, lured him back through the arches. Seemingly unnoticed save a chipmunk probing his abandoned briefcase, Wimbly was relieved at the solitude which classes being in session afforded him. Having forgotten that he dispatched the briefcase hastily to the ground upon jumping ship, he was perturbed at the nerve of the rodent, who, even as Wimbly approached, gnawed on the leather handle. After a curious moment watching the defilement of his attaché, Wimbly flicked his soiled hanky, sending the rodent scampering to a downed pudding cup. Shaking his head at the rodent’s nerve, Wimbly snatched his briefcase and proceeded to the faculty lot. Upon initial inspection, all seemed in order. The prestigious ten were tucked into their proper places and no car was absent from roster. However, as Wimbly moved toward Professor Carney-Hestelabonanzo’s sedan, the reek of fresh paint penetrated his nostrils, and he noticed something supremely unsettling. In place of the defunct vacuum sat an immaculate spot, larger than Wimbly would ever have dreamed could fit in that space. Striped with glistening white paint, the spot rendered Wimbly’s throat heavy. He stood imbecilically static at the seeming subterfuge that had occurred. Respectful of the fresh paint, Wimbly stepped into parking slot 11 to garner a better view. There, just feet from Professor Carney-Hestelabonanzo’s tarnished bronze placard, and in the spot where the vacuum's out of order sign formerly resided, was a polished bronze placard reading PROFESSOR PHILLIPE FRANCOIS

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KENSINGTON LaPEEPE V, Ph.D. Wimbly ran his finger over the deep, fresh grooves of the letters and staggered backwards. Swaying, Wimbly was gathering his wits when a shoulder tap roused him. “Assistant Professor Sinclair…Uh…Sir. I’m gonna have to ask you to leave the faculty lot on the orders of Dean Warren.” “Huh?” Wimbly turned to see a security officer grasping a baton. “Oh, yes. Of course. Yes, yes, of course. I will be running right along then. I had merely strolled up here to see if they’d managed to fix the ol’ vacuum. And, yes, well it certainly seems that is not the case seeing as the vacuum has vanished altogether and now there sits an eleventh parking slot in its place. Hmm, imagine that.” As soundly and casually as he could muster, Wimbly began to leave but, curiosity taking hold, turned back. “I was just wondering, officer, if you knew who exactly this professor…Umm…LaPeepe is?” “I’m not at liberty to share that information with you, sir.” The officer thwapped baton against hand. “Right-o then. Nice chat. Yes. Very nice, good chat.” Wimbly strode down the steps of the faculty lot towards his office, lonely and perturbed.

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Heretical Prose & Magically Real Delirium The prospect of the mysterious LaPeepe and the Shanghaiing of what he thought to be his rightful parking space stole Wimbly’s thoughts as he walked back to his office where, just moments previous, he had imagined he would never return. Relieved to find no participants from the morning’s debacle waiting to confront him, Wimbly fired a pot of tea and sat with chair’s reassuring creak. His mind was so cluttered with the events of the previous days that he could do little more than pop his briefcase in hopes of delivering irreverent laughter and jolly good times in the form of a comic. The case revealed more than the Baby Huey comic which Wimbly desired, for, atop Huey lay a large purple envelope. Upon it, WIMBLY was emblazoned in block lettering. Perplexed, he opened it and removed a stack of 15 densely typed note cards. With no attempt to read them, Wimbly

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shuffled to the final card. It was signed “Love, Estella IV.” Against his better judgment, and despite his desire to investigate the arrival of LaPeepe, Wimbly poured his tea and proceeded. As emotionally rendered as a stack of typed note cards can be, Estella IV’s letter read as follows:

My most dear professor and sometimes plaything, Wimbly, I am an emotional wreck and have been for some time. You see, as I tell you time and again, I came to Cleaver Caldwell not for its underwhelming national ranking, but for the opportunity to seduce the man whose doctoral dissertation changed my life at the age of 16...To make the seemingly bogus links you made between Evelyn Waugh and the birth of MTV with such fervent self determination, depth of indecipherable jargon, and brash disregard for the academy of which I believe you actually know so little, was truly something a young woman struggling to rise out of the oppressive government regime she found herself sold into could hold close to her bosom on cold, desolate nights...and the picture of you on the back cover, legs astride your motorcycle, hair blowing as if by some artificial wind, and a copy of The Waste Land tucked noticeably under your arm...Oh Wimbly, I didn’t even know that it was customary to publish a photo with your dissertation, but oh so marvelous it was...ALAS, I told myself I was not to gush. You see, Wimbly, I do not pen this letter to praise you, rather to unload a burden from my mind. It is no secret, Wimbly, that for some time now I have been attempting to make you, if at least for one night, mine. I apologize for my repeated advances and I now realize that the time came long ago when I should have ceased my attempts altogether. However, each time I would declare my quest over, something, your way perhaps, would again blind my more rational self. And along the way, Wimbly, I tried to refocus my efforts, I really did...And, perhaps, this is where my true downfall lies. I rededicated myself to my appearances on Oprah, took up modern tap, and, as you may know by now Wimbly, found myself a suitor. Oh, Wimbly, my suitor...Oh, poor, poor Wimbly... At the mention of Estella IV’s suitor, Wimbly’s tea attempted exit. “Oh get off it, woman. This is not even how you write. How can one expect anything sincere to come from such ludicrous melodramatic prose. You are a witty one, but pandering to my sensibility wins you no favor in this game.”

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He dropped the note cards and leaned back. LaPeepe, or at least what Wimbly imagined of him, strode into his thoughts. A jeans, tie, and dress boots sort of fellow, was the one that materialized. Yes, this LaPeepe chap had a spiky mop of black hair prematurely graying to the point of style. His jeans fit slim, and covered a pair of brown motorcycle boots, while his upper was adorned with a precisely fitting plaid shirt with solid stitching and a collar so crisp it looked as though it held neck to torso. LaPeepe was doing nothing in particular in Wimbly’s head, he was simply walking here and there in the midst of the white space. He would occasionally fidget, adjust his narrow tie, tap his antique time piece, or move the horn rimmed spectacles from eyes to teeth and possibly back. His image of LaPeepe paid no notice to Wimbly. As LaPeepe nonchalantly resided in his head, a feeling of shame began to overtake Wimbly at the brazen coldness with which the image ignored him. Incensed, Wimbly broke free and grabbed the stack of note cards. “We must tackle these conundrums one at a time dear chap, or the place we may find ourselves is nowhere more glamorous than kneeling over the waste receptacle having turned to drink to medicate our confounded mind.” He sharply tilted his head to the side as though knocking spray from a swim in the Thames out, and restarted Estella IV’s note.

...I rededicated myself to my appearances on Oprah, took up modern tap, and, as you may know by now Wimbly, found myself a suitor. Oh, Wimbly, it is my suitor...oh, poor, poor Wimbly it is my chosen suitor that grieves me now. Alas, if you do not answer when I ring you this morning, which I expect you will not seeing as you caught me attempting to consummate myself with you just two days previous, then I can make no promises as to the things I may do between then and when you read this. What I discovered under your Ph.D. boxer shorts did little less than fill my eyes with awe and send me running for unknown destinations. Wimbly, oh, dear Wimbly, do you not know the significance of what resides beneath your shorts? At this Wimbly shifted in his seat and glanced down proudly.

...Upon lifting your waistband and confronting what I’ve dreamed of since my youth, horror met my eyes as I was blinded by little more than my own Millard Fillmore. Oh, Wimbly, if only I hadn’t seen it before under another's shorts, I would simply have taken it as a wonderful sign... “This is altogether inappropriate.”

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Wimbly tossed the cards aside for a second time. “That one could be such a vile harpy in my classroom mere hours ago, and now state with passionate remorse the very same thing! I shall do myself the favor of reading no more of this wretched note.” Wimbly rose and paced. He paused at the mirror disgusted by his unkempt appearance. He ran his hands through his hair and massaged his lower lip as he contemplated his state of affairs. Said contemplation was cut short, as his rotary phone broke in with a rattling clang. With nary hesitation nor thought, Wimbly sought refuge in the call and answered. “Professor Wimbly Neville Sinclair, P-H-D.” Wimbly snapped back into form. “Yes, assistant professor Sinclair, Warren G. Warren here.” “Right-o.” Wimbly contemplated hanging up. “Wimbly, I’ll just cut right to the skunk’s stink with this.” “Yes, sir?” “I’m gonna need ya to mosey on up to my office just as soon as you can get them fine shoes a yours laced-up.” “Well, sir, Dean, sir, what might be the reason for your request?” Wimbly’s mind shot to the note, LaPeepe, his class. “Tha thang is Wimbly, I got some stuff that’s been brought to my attention and needs some tendin’ to. I’d right appreciate it if you could come on up here straight away.” “If this has anything to do with recent maneuvers by the House of Commons, I take no responsibility.” Wimbly cringed at his self-defensive attempt at humor. “I’m just gonna need you to get that behind a yours up here in a lasso’s cinch, son.” With that drawling “son” Dean Warren hung-up. Wimbly was left dumbfounded grasping the receiver. “Well what in bloody hell do I do now?” He straightened himself as best he could. Superficially all was normal by the time he was done. His suit was in place, his greasy face was clean, and his hair was appropriately frazzled. He even set the pencil in its customary position. Wimbly paid a weary sallowness about his eyes no mind as his thoughts shifted to Dean Warren.

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14

A Study in Taxidermy’s Fortune & The Spittoon Wimbly exited Expat Hall from the rear so as to avoid any students. He took a path to the Dean’s office which followed suit. Along the way his thoughts were, miraculously, blank. It was as though that day had prepared him for the worst and, as he marched to what he assumed his demise, his mind was at peace with his crumbling world. Entrenched in melancholy Wimbly entered the reception area. “Wimbly Sinclair here for Dean Warren.” “Yes, Wimbly. Mmm hmm, I think he’s expecting you.” The receptionist picked up her phone, not taking her eyes off Wimbly. “Wimbly Sinclair here to see you...Okey dokey, I’ll send him right in.” She looked to Wimbly with what he thought to be disgust. “Right in that door, skipper.” Wimbly turned and entered the tall, double doors engraved with a scene from a cattle drive, silently questioning why in the world anyone would call him skipper. It had been quite some time since Wimbly was last physically within Dean Warren’s office. During his repeated attempts at garnering a faculty parking slot, for instance, Wimbly made it no further than the outside of the Wild West doors where Dean Warren, assuming he would accept the prospect of speaking with Wimbly, would come out to meet him with a pat on the back, a sly Texas grin, and a suggestive push to the exit. Thus, it was no small matter, in Wimbly’s mind, that he was now, at the close of his ramshackle day, crossing the threshold into Dean Warren’s trophy room. ## The door pulled to a hydraulic flush and Wimbly turned to his left and threw his hands up with a shrill screech. “Bloody hell! What in the?” Wimbly stumbled backwards and fixed gaze on a towering grizzly bear reared onto its haunches, biting into a large fish. “Ain’t that just the best derned piece a taxidermy ya ever seen?” Dean Warren placed his hand on Wimbly’s trembling shoulder. “Most assuredly so, sir.” Wimbly attempted to regain what little composure he had. “I was simply shocked at the brilliant rendering of the

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ferocious beast, and was about to query if that fish in its mouth was some type of sturgeon.” “Wimbly, that sure as hell ain’t no sturgeon in that big ol’ grizzly’s mouth. Why that’s a salmon, boy...Caught it round about an hour after I shot tha grizzly. They go together like whisky and jerky, though, I’ll tell ya that much.” “Ah, yes, my idiocy. It’s been quite some time since my last foray into the field. You must excuse my rusty knowledge of the gamesman’s lexicon.” “Whatever you say boy...Ya ever touch one-a these suckers?” “Simply touch one sir? Why, I try to make a habit out of including one in my supper rations a couple times each month.” “Ya eat grizzly each month? Hot damn, if that don’t just skin the cat’s ass. Why, I never woulda -- ” “Oh. No, sir. I meant your aquatic prey.” “Well, shit, everyone eats a slab a salmon now and then, son. But not just any old man gets a chance to grab right on to a big ol’ grizzly.” Dean Warren grabbed Wimbly’s arm. “You see, sir. Actually, I don’t really think --” “Wimbly, boy, just man-up and grab right onto that there big ass claw a his.” Dean Warren pulled Wimbly’s unwilling hand toward the massive, outstretched claw. Fairly certain that even though the bear was no longer among the living, he could still manage to severely injure himself, Wimbly began to perspire and emit a soft, high pitched squeak as the claw neared. “Oh, dear me. This is most certainly --” “Boy, stop yer whinen' and enjoy this, now.” “Yes, sir.” Wimbly’s effeminate hand made contact with a massive nail. “See, boy? Now that ain’t so bad is it? Derned grizzly’s dead as Colonel Sanders and there ain’t nothin’ to be fearin’ with it.” Wimbly marveled at the size of the bear’s paw and grew more daring as his hand grasped it. “I will say, it really is a miraculous specimen. So hulking and powerful, it truly demonstrates the --” Suddenly, the paw broke from the rest of the grizzly, leaving Wimbly clutching its heft freely. “WHAT IN GOD’S NAME?” Dean Warren stepped between Wimbly and the bear, ripping the paw from his hand. “Jesus, boy, I told ya ta touch the goddam thang, not rip his derned hand clear off.”

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“Sir, I…I’ve never touched, I mean I certainly did not attempt to…” Wimbly backed towards the door, at once horrified and amazed at the sight of Dean Warren flush with anger, pointing the disembodied claw at him. “Boy, don’t think yer gettin' outta here without a fight now. Ya maimed ma grizzly!” Dean Warren dropped the paw, loosened his bolo tie and began to hop from side to side like a boxer. “Egads! Really, Dean, sir, there must be some other way to work this matter out. I mean, would a fight not place us on the very level of the beasts to which we point our muskets?” Trembling, Wimbly nodded at the grizzly killing the salmon. “Ain’t no care a mine, son. Takes a beast ta kill a beast and ya better believe yer round bout ta get yer due.” Dean Warren cornered Wimbly and put a clenched fist under his chin. “Good Christ!” Wimbly slunk down the wall and knelt in a protective clump. Dean Warren bounced around above the cowering Wimbly, punching into the air. Wimbly was silent save some dull muttering. After a moment Dean Warren stopped bouncing and tapped Wimbly on the shoulder. With the hesitancy of Lennox Lewis cornered, Wimbly raised his head from under his arms only to see Dean Warren flush, not with anger, but with laughter. “Oh boy, oh boy! Hot damn, if that wasn’t tha best goddam reaction I’ve ever gotten ta that trick then Warthog Willie Warren wasn’t ma grand pappy!” Dean Warren walked back to the grizzly, picked up the paw, and clicked it back onto the arm. “By God, man!” “Wimbly, boy, ya fell fer that hook, line, and lead shot.” “So that was all fiddle faddle?” “Sure as shit.” “Have you actually pulled that most nefarious and cunning ruse on someone other than me?” “You bet yer trap door long johns, boy.” Dean Warren walked over to his desk, untied a small leather bag, and loaded his mouth with tobacco. “And Frank be my momma’s name if ya ain’t the second sunnuvabitch that fell fer it today.” He sharply spit with a plink into a brass spittoon near Wimbly. Upon hitting, the spit slid down the can and into the pool of the old, sending a pungent musk sourly through Wimbly’s nostrils.

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“You say you pulled this incomprehensible gag on another poor wretch this very day? How interesting it is.” Wimbly paused, choking on the aroma. “Darn right, and it reminds me a tha reason I wanned ya here in the first place.” Dean Warren kicked up his feet. “Oh, yes. It seems in the excitement of the hunt I’d forgotten all about the task at hand…Incidentally, sir, what exactly is the task at hand?” “It ain’t all that bad, Wimbly. Actually, I’d say it’s a perty derned good task.” “Good. I should hope so sir. I mean I certainly do not want to find myself mixed up in any sordid wrong doings.” “Sordid deeds ya say?” Dean Warren leaned forward and motioned for Wimbly to sit with a spit and plink. “Hmm, ya done tellin' me...I ain’t one fer anything sordid.” “Yes, well, yes.” Wimbly was confused as to the direction of Dean Warren’s topic. “Nope, I ain’t got ya here ta talk about sordid things.” Wimbly leaned back in his chair, relieved at one bullet dodged. “Why I got ya here in such a hurry is ta tell ya about a change in faculty here at Cleaver Caldwell.” Wimbly’s thoughts shifted to LaPeepe. “In person, sir? Why that seems like an unnecessary gesture.” “Tha thang is, I just wanned ta tell ya myself, cause, well, I’m real proud a this young buck we managed ta bag, and I just wanna be certain he feels like he’s in his momma’s pantry bakin’ biscuits and warmin’ his haunches by tha stove on a chilly winter’s eve.” “Come again, sir?” “All I’m sayin is that I want this new boy ta feel at home like he’s at his family’s bait shop, and I’m gonna be needin’ all tha help I can wrangle.” “I see, sir. So this new Cleaver Caldwell faculty member, he’s a man of the country like yourself?” “Nope. Not the case I’m afraid, or I wouldn’t need you.” Dean Warren stood up, plinked, and paced behind his desk. “Need me, sir?” “You bet, boy. Ya see, the guy, this new guy, he’s some kinda Frenchie er somethin’.” “A Frenchie you say? I fear, I don’t quite follow...”

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“Boy, his name, he’s some kinda Frenchie, and I don’t know squat about Frenchies.” “You say his name, sir? What exactly might his name be, if you don’t mind my prying?” “His name is LaPeepey...Professor Phillipe LaPeepey.” “Are you most sure it is not LaPeepe, sir? Professor Phillipe Francois Kensington LaPeepe, hold the ‘y’.” “Well, I’ll be General Custer too stubborn ta retreat, boy. How’d ya know that?” Wimbly paused, unsure weather to reveal his foray into the faculty lot. “I believe I’ve read some of his papers, sir. Yes, somewhere down the line. That most certainly must be it.” “Shit, that’s good news, especially seein’ as I’m fixin' to get you two together for some bonding.” “You would like Professor LaPeepe and I to bond? But what for, sir?” “Like I been tellin’ ya, Wimbly, this LaPeepe is onehelluva fine catch for Cleaver Caldwell and I just wanna make sure we set that hook good and deep so we don’t lose him before we even get him in tha boat.” “Yes, I see that, but why me, sir? Why not someone more inclined to the practice of social courtesies? Professor Carney-Hestelabonanzo perhaps?” “No can do. This Frenchie’s got somethin’ about his way that reminds me a you, Wimbly. So, I’m thinkin’ that you two’d be a perty good pair.” “Well, I…” Wimbly, was so taken aback by the suggestion that an objection could not surface. “It’s settled, then.” Dean Warren picked up his phone. “Berta, could ya get me LaPeepe? Thanks.” Wimbly and Dean Warren sat in silence. Wimbly pondered how he would deal with the man whom he resented for his parking slot alone, while Dean Warren simply smiled and worked his chaw. “This is just all so…I guess I just don’t really know what to think about this, sir. I mean, it’s not that--” “Boy, that LaPeepe fell fer the ol’ lopped off paw trick even harder than you.” “So he’s the --”

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“It came off in his mitt and, boy, he looked like he’d just fallen into the briar patch on a humid afternoon wearin' nothin’ but cutoff overalls.” “I take it he --” Dean Warren’s phone interrupted Wimbly. “Yep, Berta, send him in.” He flung the remainder of the wad into the spittoon. “Frenchie’s here.”

15

Where We Have Come From, Where We Do Go Frenchie, that is to say Phillipe Francois Kensington LaPeepe, was not, in fact, the first nemesis to cross Wimbly’s meticulously selfdestined path. It was, in point of ungodly anguish, a fact that Wimbly had a similarly foreboding experience with another seeming foreigner, fifteen years previous. It was at the height of Wimbly’s garage empire -- a point just days before Carla Erickson’s first lurid advances upon his mangled frame -while Wimbly was labeling cubby units for Robert “Red Jaw” Peterson’s ice fishing paraphernalia, that a peculiar sight flickered past. From his half cocked vantage just beyond Red Jaw’s shed turned ice fishing shanty, and amidst an intriquately tangled lump of fishing line, he saw a red flash dart from leftmost vantage to right. “BLAZES!” Wimbly walked through the shanty to the open garage door. Feet perched on garage’s precipice, fishing line in hand, Wimbly peered down the driveway; downtown Duluth and Lake Superior comprising the background a mile below. He wiped his brow with an ironed bandana and glanced right, the direction of the red flash which had diverted his seemingly impenetrable focus. Muskellunge Mile, to his slight disappointment, was vacant, save Ed Shickinjanskie’s rusted plow rig and a seafoam green Winnebago tow-behind. “It was but an errant cardinal perilously far from the more temperate Southern confines of Fall.” Wimbly turned back to Red Jaw’s tackle and found himself face to face with the American Outdoorsman personified.

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“It were but a what?” Red Jaw belched as he approached with a crooked, side-by-side Remington over his arm while working a steel-wired barrel cleaning brush vigorously under the rear of his shirt. Wimbly stepped back, startled by both gun and breath. “Yikes! I did not see you there, Mr. Peterson.” Wimbly cringed at Red Jaw’s method of itching his back. “Red Jaw, son. Red Jaw.” He scanned the horizon. “Inside cleanin' the 12 gauge. Needed some more grease.” “I see.” “Ya say, that was but a -- ?” “Oh, yes. I believe I just saw a cardinal breeze fluidly down Muskellunge and towards the lake below.” “Humph. Cardinal. Humph.” With a quick jerk of his wrist the Remington snapped shut. Red Jaw grabbed a small tube of grease and went back inside. Wimbly swore he could smell krumkake baking as the door swung shut. “Strange fellow.” Wimbly shifted focus back to the jumbled line. Deftly he grabbed one slightly bowed loop, tugged, and the jumble released its grasp. “Splendid.” A soft whiz grew to a resounding purr as Wimbly leapt back to garage’s edge. There, at the precise spot where Wimbly had seen the phantom flash, Wimbly spotted not a cardinal, but a cherry red racing bicycle with tan leather grips hugging its curled handlebars. Astride its matching seat was a lad of similar pubescent age as Wimbly. He wore a red bandana, dark aviator sunglasses, and blonde, to the point of white shoulder length hair held back with a red sweatband. The boy was, surely, new. It was a quick moment, the kind so fleeting that a less astute observer may credit it as being imagination’s figment, but Wimbly, nonetheless, lived it as if in slow motion. The bike was a Lemond Red Racer, and its Italian leather seat and grips, both a pure shade of tan, were clearly not stock. The tires were an unprecedented white, and the pedals, toe clips, and stem were among the most pristine examples of German steel he’d ever witnessed. The chain, gears, and sprockets, engaged and spun with the perfection of a movie sound effect; not a chink or clank to be found with a stethoscope. Yes, the machine was a marvel.

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However, the bicycle alone was not, for that moment, instant, flicker, eternity, the sole cause of the extra sensory movement of Wimbly’s every body hair. A Dutch Master’s cigar box slipped from his hand to the gravel below, expelling a Piccadilly variety of rusted hooks. Wimbly simply patted brow and followed the lad’s retreating locks down the street. “Who in blazes?” Wimbly’s penny loafers shifted and the gravel crackled while he walked toward street’s edge, eyes watering. “Ulrich Ping!” A gloved hand shot through Wimbly’s view and tires screeched at his side. “My goodness!” Wimbly wheeled to face the voice. “Did I frighten you? If so, please accept my apologies. I say, I’m Ulrich Abraham Ping.” The boy rested against the bike’s sleek handlebars, one hand outstretched, the other supporting his chin. “Huh. No. Most certainly not, I was simply questioning who, well, whose rusted camping contraption that might be.” Wimbly nodded towards the tow-behind, uncomfortable and exposed. “Why, chappy, that’s Mr. Jacob Tjomsland’s Winnebago.” “I see. How do you…Well, I mean to say who are…Where, from?” Wimbly shifted, absorbing the magnificence in his presence. “I’m new to town, you see. My father is the acclaimed Hans Ping, cyclist, philanthropist and revolutionary.” Ping adjusted his headband and took off his aviators. “We have only just moved to your…” Hans scanned the horizon, stopping at a dead gopher, pushed aside by a street sweeper. “Quaint hamlet. I especially like the hills.” Ignoring the carcass, Wimbly tapped the chrome of Ulrich’s bike, and coughed. “It truly is a feat.” Wimbly circled Ulrich and the bike with a renewed vigor spurned by the felled gopher. “Your cycle is truly top notch. I heard its whimsical purr whilst endeavoring in this garage and was compelled to watch as it passed. Truly a paramount specimen.” Ulrich stepped back, surprised by Wimbly’s presence. “I say, chappy, are you of this Duluth region?” “In a word.” “Astounding! From your tone and dress, you seem some odd derivative of the lads in my birthing home of French Algiers and my school chums at London’s Peacock School for the Children of International Diplomats and

Freedom Fighters.”

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“Most assuredly, I am but an organic specimen of the very region in which we find ourselves.” Wimbly moved to the downed Dutch Masters box. “Extraordinary. A rare species. Indeed, I was not aware the swan could be born of mergansers.” Ulrich followed Wimbly, his face twisting. “Well, you see, Duluth is not always what is seems.” Wimbly attempted to sort the downed hooks. “I, by the way, am Wimbly.” “Wimbly? Superb! Wimbly what?” Ulrich kneeled to where Wimbly sorted. Wimbly worked in silence for a moment, head down, painfully aware of Ulrich’s stare. “Johnson.” “Johnson? Johnson! Well, if it isn’t a merganser after all.” Ulrich assumed the subtly cocky tone that his persona suggested all along. “Yes, Wimbly Johnson. Do you have some type of ill regard for my family name?” Wimbly, frustrated shifted gaze to Ulrich. “No, chappy. Most heartily not. It is a fine name.” “I agree.” Wimbly rose, clearly done with the subject. “This, of course, is not your house?” Ulrich scanned Red Jaw’s garage -- the fishing shanty, two rusted John Deere snowmobiles, the cab of a rusted Ford pick-up truck -- as he fingered a worm crusted hook. “No, in fact. This is the home of Red Jaw Peterson and his wife Dorothy. I am of their humble employ.” Wimbly grabbed an empty Folgers can among his afternoon’s work. “Yes. You are their garage man are you?” “In a word. I am charged with organizing their belongings.” Wimbly bent to finish with the hooks. “Unfortunate…For me.” Ulrich again knelt beside Wimbly. With the fluidity of newly tapped Boddingtons, he sifted through the remainder of the hooks, completing the task in but a moment. “Might I suggest a series of Windsor Match boxes as adequate housing for this varying catalogue of hooks? The uniformity of size and shape is immensely superior when arranging on shelves of limited square footage.” Wimbly glared defiantly at Ulrich’s uniform piles. “Ahh, Chappy. I too am a garage man.” Ulrich mounted his bike, spit, and sped down the driveway pausing to glance back to Wimbly and, with nary a wasted movement, flick an undersized note card.

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“Au revoir, ennemi juré.” Ulrich vanished as the object struck the Wimbly between the eyes and fluttered down to pristine rest at his feet. Blank, Wimbly stared at the place Ulrich had been. He looked to the empty street and to the ground in front of him where, as if illuminated, Wimbly saw the flicked object resting, slightly tilted towards him. An aged white of the dignified variety, the object was a heavy set, rectangular slice of business card. It embodied edgy class. Splendid. With a meticulously engraved typeface the card was clearly not a homemade job and, as Wimbly stooped to retrieve it, he realized that the card stock on which it was printed was no trifle either. “Frigging bugger.” Wimbly thumbed the card. “It is exquisite.” Classically and with no wasted detail the card read:

ULRICH HANSEL PING, ESQ. *WORLD JOURNEYMAN *PROVOCATEUER *SEER OF ALL THINGS GLORIOUS *GARAGE MAN

16 APPLE GLEN ROAD, DULUTH MN (218) 473 – 0566 The awe inspired by Ulrich’s card was poignant but short lived as Wimbly’s focused on its implications. “What in God’s name does he mean when he says ‘ennemi juré’ for that matter?” Wimbly slid the card into his Velcro Paddington Bear wallet and proceeded, distracted, to the fish hooks. “And, really, a business card for a 15-year-old. He is but a boy -- Provocateur!” “Boy!” Wimbly spun, startled at Red Jaw looming behind him. “Sir…Red Jaw. You’ve startled me again.” Wimbly watched Red Jaw fiddle with, and load, his shotgun. “What’s that look? Ya never seen a man loading a shotgun before?” “Well, since you say it, sir, no, not actually.” “Not a hunter?” “Why would you, just now…I mean, we are in your drive, sir?” “I’m not loading it to shoot, boy. Just making sure these shells fit. Just found them in tha’ junk drawer.” Red Jaw brought the gun to his shoulder, squinted, and tracked a flock of mallards. “I see.” Wimbly scanned him and went back to the hooks.

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“BANG – skeeeeeeeeeeeeee!” Red Jaw crooked the gun and removed the shells. “I coulda hit them with a rock, I tell ya.” “Yes. I will vouch. You could have bagged the whole bunch, sir, Red Jaw.” “Boy, how many barrels ya count here? Two. Two barrels, two shells, two shots.” Red Jaw shook his head and put the shells back in his pocket. “Six ducks.” “Yes. Bad mathematics on my part.” “It’s no matter, boy. You woulda gotten the other two and Dorothy woulda had the other two. Right? Right.” Red Jaw set the shotgun aside. “Say, I heard ya talkin' to someone out here. It’s why I came back out…That, and because Dorothy’s fixin krumkake in there and she made me leave ‘cause I was sneakin’ tastes.” “Well, Red Jaw, yes. You heard correctly. I was talking to a young fellow who just rode this way on his bicycle.” Wimbly thought about pulling the card, but decided against it. “Ping. The fellow’s name was Ulrich Ping.” “Yep. I know Ulrich Ping. Just moved to Apple Glen.” “Yes, that is the Ping with whom I spoke.” “His dad’s some sorta diplomat. Name’s Hans.” “So you’ve met them?” “You betcha. Ulrich came around the neighborhood last week passing out business cards, and I ran into Hans at the Club.” “I see.” “Tha young fella was pedaling his garage cleanin’ services.” Red Jaw glanced at Wimbly. “Yes. He mentioned that he too dabbled in exterior organization.” Red Jaw scanned the garage, still in mid-organizational disarray. “Humph.” “Ah, yes. Still very much a work in progress.” Wimbly was unnerved. “You do a good job, boy.” Red Jaw patted Wimbly’s shoulder. “Don’t worry.” “No worries here, sir.” “Grand.” Red Jaw turned to go inside and looked down at his shotgun. “It’s funny, though, Ulrich Ping…his dad’s a big game hunter. Kid’s been hunting since he was in diapers.” Pale, shaking, Wimbly looked up from the hooks. “Sir?”

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“Yep.” “Would you happen to have any Windsor Match boxes?”

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The Origins of Tea Wimbly stood, left leg oddly numb, with a slight urge to release that afternoon’s intake of Earl Grey. So, Frenchie was there? A fellow, who he had only considered for the brevity of an afternoon’s siesta, had penetrated his consciousness to the point of subjugating any semblance of Estella IV’s public ousting at day’s start. Wimbly heard the prattling of keys and verbose flirtation from outside of Dean Warren’s door. He glanced to the spittoon and then to Dean Warren while attempting a pose of superiority with which to greet LaPeepe. Wimbly’s eyes burned a rough, projected image upon the door. In a crusty, sepia tone, Wimbly saw the LaPeepe who had stepped into his thoughts earlier. However, this LaPeepe was wearing the poorly died, mismatched whites of a Cowboy. Boots, chaps, gun belt, shirt, rustling leathers, bandana, and Stetson; all their own breed of authentic white. As with his movements earlier, this LaPeepe merely strode around, somewhere between gallant swagger and nervous arrhythmia, all the while tapping an ivory gripped Colt. The image crackled forth, revealing a black mass about which LaPeepe circled. Wimbly craned his neck to garner better vantage of this illusory image. His leg regained feeling and his urge to urinate subsided as he realized that the mass upon which LaPeepe circled was, in fact, some odd Wild West derivative of himself. Complete with a scraggled beard, Wimbly’s image was lashed to a rocking chair. The chair resembled one his grandmother, Zelda used to rock baby Wimbly -still Matthew at that point -- to sleep in, while drink fingers of whisky. Wimbly was wearing an ensemble corresponding with LaPeepe’s. Initially pleased that he was the one wearing black, Wimbly was soon horrified to realize that his garb was decidedly inauthentic looking. His blacks were rich and his shirt shined with the gloss of some type of silk or suitable synthetic substitute. His Stetson was high and had nary an out of place crease. Wimbly’s anger at the faux Cowboy get-up was infinitely worsened when he realized that the shirt was, in fact, glinting with rhinestones.

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It was just as Wimbly became aware that his armory was but a Red Rider B-B Gun, which lay between his gold-capped boots, that the door was flung open. A flood of neon light from the reception area drowned the room. Momentarily blinded by the gaseous influx, Wimbly rubbed his eyes, attempting to regain his sight so as to view the physical embodiment of LaPeepe. He regained focus and leveled his stare on the backlit form in the doorway. A tall, slender shape and a scratchy array of hair were all that could be distinguished. The door flushed shut and LaPeepe spun to his left and performed a 1-2 combination on the grizzly, finishing with a swift snatch of the paw. “I won’t be had this time, monsieur grizzly!” LaPeepe proceeded to attach the paw to his carabineer key chain utilizing the natural loop created by thumb and index. “Quite true you did gash my ego earlier this very day, but whom is who’s charm of luck now? It is but I, Phillipe Francois Kensington LaPeepe V and you are now but décor for my Aston Martin keys!” “Hot damn, LaPeepe! Ya took revenge on ma grizzly!” Dean Warren thrust his eager palm toward the gleaming LaPeepe. “One helluva comeback!” “No grizzly will make mince meat out of the great LaPeepe and live to glorify his conquest.” LaPeepe unclasped the paw, pulled it into his shirtsleeve, and met Dean Warren’s extended hand. “A pittance.” “Shit, boy. Ya got a grizzly paw fer a hand!” Dean Warren reared and shot the remainder of his chew into the spittoon as he grabbed the paw. LaPeepe, still in shadow, shifted stare to Wimbly looking as thought he had just amused a child with nothing more than an empty roll of waste paper. Dean Warren, catching his breath, also turned to Wimbly who stood mesmerized by the ludicrous display. “Shhhheeeit!” Dean Warren was still, miraculously, regaining his composure. “LaPeepe, this here is Assistant Professor Sinclair. He’s tha feller I mentioned.” Wimbly gazed at the brass buckle of LaPeepe’s leather boots. “Yes. I, fellow, am Wimbly. Wimbly Neville Sinclair.” He moved toward LaPeepe with nervous vigor. “The first.” Wimbly and LaPeepe stood inches apart. Nearly duplicates in height, they were separated by a line of shadow bisecting Dean Warren’s office.

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“The first you say? Why, that is certainly a peculiar intonation.” LaPeepe spun a toothpick in his mouth and back out with a half grin. “I, of course, am Phillipe Francois Kensington LaPeepe.” He spit the toothpick with the velocity of a greased dart across Wimbly’s brow and into the spittoon, as he stepped across the border of illumination. “The fifth.” Wimbly took full inventory of LaPeepe for the first time. Very much the double of the person who had twice infiltrated his imagination, there was one aspect that, only then, penetrated Wimbly’s realm of perception. While Wimbly noted what was, true to his vision, a vintage timepiece, the light pigment of LaPeepe’s palm stirred him. As his eyes worked their way up LaPeepe’s blazer clad frame and to his face, it was all Wimbly could manage to remain upright. Phillipe Francois Kensington LaPeepe V, Wimbly tabulated, was of the dark skinned variety.

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