Wednesday, September 8, 2021

13,808. THE KETTLEDRUM SOCIETY MATCHBOOK FUND

THE KETTLEDRUM SOCIETY MATCHBOOK FUND
When he asked for money I said
I didn't know there was a kettledrum
society matchbook fund. Then I
added how I didn't know there was
a kettledrum society. It all went on
from there and I really could have
started to doubt everything.

He was washing dishes and baby 
clothes too. A very domestic man,
I thought. On his kitchen table,
where I'd been sitting, was a set
of books, by the Dalai Lama and 
by Deepak Chopra. That could
have explained a lot.
-
He said his wife was away for
two weeks, visiting in Minnesota,
a sick mother or something of that
nature. She was an Ojibwe native.
He kept the TV on for his company
while alone, and it lulled the baby
to sleep. It had the opposite effect 
on me, I told him, like nails on a
blackboard in a locked-down school. 
All I wished to do was flee.
-
Whatever and however that kettledrum
thing was, he'd brought it up coyly and
with some skill too. Woven it right in
to whatever we were talking about. 
Sly dude. Slippery fellow. Like a
white man, with an Indian,
ready for the kill.


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