Andrew Plattner ~ Isosceles

“What do you want?” Jeff said, his voice sound­ing above, from inside the thir­ty-foot-tall slide tow­er.  Eddie stood on the grass just out­side the play­ground floor, which was cov­ered in mulch. “I’ve dis­cov­ered unopened cans of beer up here. Three of them, tall boys … how’d you know where to find me?”

Eddie said, “I didn’t.” Near the tow­er stood the pic­nic pavil­ion. A pair of swing sets with isosce­les tri­an­gle frames, paint­ed orange. Two chil­dren went like pen­du­lums. Periwinkle and seafoam climb­ing blocks. A quar­ter-moon shaped mound. A woman rest­ed on a near­by bench.

“I’m not com­ing down.” Jeff’s voice had a metal­lic echo. He peeked out from the open door­way at the top of the tow­er. “There you are look­ing lost.” He retreat­ed. “Doctor Gentry phoned, the can­cer is back.”

Eddie said, “I heard the door slam.”

“It’s over.”

“Do you want me to stay?”

Jeff said, “I’m terrified.”

“I’m your hus­band, I’ll be with you.”

“I’m not com­ing down. Wait all day if you want.”

The gate to the spi­ral steps inside the tow­er was locked as the tow­er was fre­quent­ly used as either a toi­let or hide­out for drug activ­i­ty. Eddie pic­tured Jeff run­ning up the slide to reach the apex of the tow­er. Having to hang onto the rails. Eddie went over, took a seat on the bench by the woman, who now showed a kind­ly, hurt expres­sion. He held his head in his hands.

**

Periodically, the Playscapes play­ground would be revived. New coats of paint on the Noguchi designs, fresh cedar mulch cov­er­ing the grounds. This time, the ren­o­va­tion appeared more pur­pose­ful. The bon­net roof of the pavil­ion need­ed replac­ing. A mini-doz­er had scraped away not only the mulch, but a lay­er of soil. Temporary cyclone fenc­ing had been set up around the area; only hard hats were allowed inside.

Eddie stood beyond the fence, along with Dominic, each in a blaz­er; Eddie’s black, Dominic’s teal. “Will your mom be wait­ing on us?” Dominic said.

“No,” Eddie said. “We’re not in a hur­ry just now. Are you in a hurry?”

“No.” He bumped light­ly into Eddie and smiled.

At Peachtree Corners, nurse Rae led them to the door­way of his mother’s room. In her wheel­chair, she was motion­less, her white hair combed over. In her direc­tion, Rae said, “Look who’s here.”

“That’s a pret­ty sweater she has on,” Dominic said.

“I gave it to her,” Eddie said, draw­ing in a breath. “For her birthday.”

 “Lunch is com­ing,” Rae said. “Arms out.” Eddie oblig­ed. She gave him a quick pat down. “Such a good son.”

“Oh, this is Dominic,” Eddie said.

“Hi.”

“Hello,” Dominic said.

Rae said, “New faces can bring new perspectives.”

Eddie and Dominic moved chairs. Eddie sat close to his moth­er. “I like the light in this room, don’t you?” he said, towards Dominic, a few feet away.

“That’s a beau­ti­ful sweater, Mrs. Dill,” Dominic said.

 For the first time, his moth­er seemed to notice. “Jeff?” she said.

 “Momma, that’s Dominic,” he said. “We’re friends.”

“Well, more than friends,” Dominic said.

 Eddie regard­ed him, forced a smile, then let it drop.

“Jeff,” his moth­er said.

“No,” Eddie said.

When Rae brought the tray, Eddie accept­ed it. Turkey with gravy, baby peas, apple sauce, fruit drink, Jello cup. Eddie took a lit­tle taste of each item, except the Jello. “Jesus,” he said, after the apple­sauce. Rae lin­gered near the foot of the bed. “I’m only doing what I’m told,” Eddie said, keep­ing his eyes on his moth­er, who had her mouth opened. He shook his head. “I swear, you try to sneak in one Chik-Fil‑A.”

“She prob­a­bly has sen­si­tive diges­tion,” Dominic offered.

“I’m aware,” Eddie said. “Here, Momma. Peas.”

“Let me know if y’all need any­thing,” Rae said.

“Kisses,” Eddie said, quietly.

**

His moth­er read about Playscapes in the Doraville Neighbor, car­ried the arti­cle to the din­ner table. A play­ground of the future designed by Isamu Noguchi, the only one of its kind in America. The artist want­ed chil­dren to famil­iar­ize them­selves with shapes, col­ors, tex­tures. It was agreed upon the three of them would go. On a Saturday morn­ing, they sat down for breakfast.

“About this,” his father said. “I feel like fish­ing. Lake Walton. Pretty day like today. If you’re pack­ing a lunch, you can make a cou­ple of sand­wich­es for me, too.”

“Ask him if he wants to go fish­ing,” she said. Neither his father nor Eddie spoke. She said, “The point is that we planned on going to the park. That’s what he’s been look­ing for­ward to. Go fish­ing next week.”

“Go to the park next week,” he said. Honeysweet, I’m tired of the line. Chassis, chas­sis, chas­sis.  Don’t feel like dri­ving down to the city today. I’m beat. Fishin’, I can just sit there, try to fig­ure things out.”

“I want the Mav.”

“Take it,” he said. “Maybe Odell Odom will want to go to the lake, I’ll walk to the Yellow Store and he can car­ry me. You all can tell me all about the park tonight.”

“You gonna tell us all about your fishin’?” she said.

“You want to come with me, come right ahead.”

She said, “Get dressed for the park, Eddie.”

“He’s not fin­ished eat­ing yet. Goddamn, don’t you think he’s a lit­tle old for a playground?”

“I want him to see it.”

“Ask him what he wants to do.” His father held up his hand, and they turned to Eddie.

Eddie didn’t want to say Playground. So, he said, “Park.”

His moth­er said, “Take your plate to your room. Go into your room, close the door, fin­ish your break­fast, get dressed, bring your plate out, set it in the sink. Go on.”

He closed the door to his room. He car­ried his plate to the desk under the win­dow that looked out to their street, Blue Oak, and worked on his break­fast. There were the voic­es of his par­ents. The food nev­er stayed warm, that’s how long their meals took. There weren’t many argu­ments out­side the kitchen table, and his par­ents didn’t like to raise their voic­es. He picked apart his waf­fle with his hands. He eased out of the room, car­ried his cup of grits to the bath­room, dumped them into the toi­let, flushed. On the loveseat by the front door, he wait­ed for his mother.

They sped towards the city sky­line in the cola-col­ored Maverick, a car she loved. Driving it made her hap­py and he felt his spir­it ris­ing with her. Eddie said, I don’t real­ly like fish­ing at all, and she laughed and said, Odell Odom my behind. Baby, he ain’t goin’ fishin’. But nei­ther are we. Right? It didn’t mat­ter what she meant. She said they need­ed to look for the Georgia Tech exit and then he was point­ing like he’d spot­ted a comet. They went along 10^th Street, pass­ing the Aquarius Lounge and the mar­quee of the 10^th Street Theater. Wow Show! Starring Roz & Jon, and the Women. They parked in a neigh­bor­hood near Grady High. Piedmont Park shone with spring; the bloom­ing dog­woods made them sneeze. Funny-smelling smoke, hip­pies like in the mag­a­zines. When he asked if they would see Sonny & Cher, she hugged him tight, and said he was the sweet­est boy in the world and she’d love him till the end of time. He loved her. The dogs peo­ple walked were friend­ly. They found the play­ground, with its bright col­ors and unique angles. He felt too old to fool with it, but she want­ed him to push her on a swing. His hands pressed against her shoul­der blades, and she went fur­ther into the air. He could feel her ener­gy. Freedom.

**

On a Friday morn­ing, he had two vir­tu­al meet­ings, one at nine, the oth­er at ten. Then, he closed his lap­top, padded into the kitchen, set his phone to a café sounds web­site. His cat, Hector, twirled at his feet. Eddie opened a tin of cat food, scraped it into Hector’s bowl, then sprin­kled on parme­san cheese. Eddie made a huge bowl of pimen­to cheese, fin­ished the mix with a few splash­es of Tabasco. Hector leapt onto the counter. “Na-uh,” Eddie said. He extract­ed a sheet of cook­ies from the oven. “Down, mis­ter,” he said. “Thank you.” Eddie used a whole loaf of bread, made sand­wich­es, cut­ting off the crusts, then wrap­ping each in cel­lo­phane. He opened a pack­et of brown paper lunch bags, and into every one went a sand­wich and cook­ies. If he had thought ahead, he would’ve includ­ed apples. He placed all the bags in a large can­vas tote with Barcelona in bright blue let­ters. He clicked away the café sounds, dressed, then sat in the qui­et of his liv­ing room. Hector joined him.

From his apart­ment on Juniper Street, Eddie marched in the direc­tion of the park. He crossed 10^th, then 11^th, where a 30-sto­ry apart­ment com­plex, Ascent, neared com­ple­tion. He stood at a stop­light with a gag­gle of con­struc­tion work­ers, can­vas tote at his side.

At the cyclone fenc­ing around Playscapes, he called out to a cou­ple of hard­hats, a man and woman dressed the same, in long-sleeve bright orange t‑shirts, fad­ed jeans, steel-toed boots. He extract­ed one brown bag, then lift­ed the can­vas tote over the fence. “For you all,” he said. “As a big thanks. That’s a fam­i­ly recipe.” The work­ers appeared uncer­tain. “Go ahead,” Eddie said. They car­ried it away, and the woman called out to anoth­er hard-hat. “Wait!” Eddie said. “I want that tote back!”

On the way up to Peachtree Corners, he didn’t both­er putting on music from his phone, even in the turtling traf­fic. As he entered the build­ing, he had the remain­ing brown bag with him. He spot­ted Rae in the rec room, play­ing cards with two old­er men. She laid down her cards, nod­ded to them. “I brought you lunch,” he said. As she approached, he noticed her swallowing.

“You okay?” she said. He held up the bag. She embraced him. She whis­pered, “I know. It’s all right.”

He held onto her, and then he stepped back. “Is she up?”

“Yes,” Rae said. “I’ll bring her tray …”

“In a lit­tle bit, okay?”

“Sure.”

Eddie tapped on the par­tial­ly opened door to his mother’s room. “Hey,” he said. He car­ried a chair over by her. When she observed his expres­sion, he felt her frown. He took her hand with both of his, and they sat in the qui­et. He snif­fled. “Oh, mom­ma. I loved him so much,” he said.

~

Andy Plattner has a new­ly pub­lished nov­el-in-sto­ries, Stymie, from Mercer University Press.