Free Something in My Eye: Stories by Michael Jeffrey Lee Page B

husband and wife sat down to dinner. “How was your day?” said the husband.
    â€œMy day passed as any other,” said the wife, “except that I suddenly was able to perceive the distant drums from within the confines of our great house.”
    â€œI thought so,” said the husband. “I thought I heard them too.”
    The next morning the husband again spoke to the guard, who appeared slightly nervous at his post.
    â€œThe noises are becoming louder,” said the husband. “How do you explain this?”
    â€œThere must be a celebration within the forest,” said the guard.
    â€œBut the sound is so mournful,” replied the husband.
    â€œThey are very sad people,” replied the guard.
    â€œIs that not them dancing just behind the first row of trees?” said the husband.

    â€œMy eyesight is leaving me,” replied the guard. “You might need to hire another.”
    â€œVery well,” said the husband, and he returned home.
    That evening the husband and wife sat down to dinner. “I learned the origin of the noises today,” said the husband.
    â€œYes?” she replied.
    â€œThe people of the forest are having a party,” said the husband.
    â€œYou know it makes me sad to hear that word,” said the wife, bittersweetly patting his hand.
    That night the couple said a prayer in which they thanked a higher power that they had each other and a great house to live in.
    The next morning, there was an uprising in the forest, and by noontime the destitute and abject had armed themselves with stones, ropes, and firearms, and soon had taken the fence, slaughtered the guards, and overrun the great house. Easily captured, the husband and wife were paraded about the compound in chains, and fed rainwater and grubs of the forest for their meals. By nightfall they were tried for malfeasance and found guilty and sentenced to hang at midnight, side by side, from a beam above the wide porch.
    As the nooses tightened around their necks, the husband said: “The forest has overrun our great house. Certainly now we might have our children.”
    The wife looked out over the crowd of hateful faces. “Yes,” she said. “I don’t know.”

3. THE FAST MEAL
    During a time of great wealth in the country, a number of those who had plenty took to the forest, where they lived in self-inflicted poverty in the hopes that they might get back to the marrow of experience, which had long since vacated human life.
    One day, a widower, who lived in the city with his three middle-aged sons, decided such a change might be beneficial, so he sold the house and all of their belongings, liquidated his mutual funds, gave his monies to several pet charities, and, in order to symbolically finalize this severing, pushed the family vehicle over a nearby cliff.
    When he had finished, he wiped his hands on his slacks and said to his sons, “I fondly remember in hallucinatory fragments the essence of human life, which you were born too late to know. We will go to it now, and feed upon it.”
    The sons, who had grown quite comfortable in middle age, became very moody, and voiced their misgivings. Although none worked, all had busy schedules, and so they said to their father, “You elders with your mad and flickering visions. You will drive this generation to ruin! It is only you who fear time’s passage, only you who inhibit our fun. Why not let us live the life promised to us as wealthy citizens of this country?”
    â€œThe forest still holds revelatory potential, no matter how debased our dealings with it have heretofore been,” said the father. “Furthermore, what kind of father would I be if I denied my sons the access to the wisdom of the ages? I would be the kind of man that the Good Lord, His infinite mercy notwithstanding, would not, and should not, let die.”
    â€œVery well,” said the eldest and youngest sons, who were