It was strange to Abigail – she had never much liked drawing or even doodling. She wondered if it had something to do with physical ease of dragging a pencil against paper. When she was chipping wood away, her mind would be so absent of the image – or anything really – as her hands seemed to be focussed and preoccupied enough for the whole of her.

Occasionally her mother, whose routine these days was emptying a pack of cigarettes in the kitchen until she felt the obligation to prepare some form of a dinner, would forget to shut the back door. In such instances, it would be common that the billow and escape through screen door’s shoddy wire, and the cloud would distract Abigail, letting all the sounds and sights of the here and now remind her of something big and scary and not altogether real. There was an ever-present darkness within and among Abigail that was difficult for her understand or even really be aware of, let alone explain to her mother or school chums.

Actually, it’s tricky for me to explain too, because I’m not Abigail, but I do know more about it than you. All that I can feel comfortable saying about the darkness is that each etch and groove that was chiseled from the pine was bit of whiteness carved out from behind the mass of pitch-blackess she could sense. However, her hands knew that evening out all of the floorboards to a new, more or less, flat surface would just yield all of the white dim down into what it had been. There was something important in the tactile variance of depth. Something real.

Spin the seasons one good turn and you’ll see Abigail, still young but much older, standing on the rails and digging the knife into top-most trim of the porch, where the design had grown and where it would end.

Eventually, Abigail hopped down, barefoot onto the rough and ornate floor of the porch. She didn’t really know what to do. After a silent meal with her mother in a smoke-drenched kitchen, she decided it might be time to visit her father’s grave.

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Who is the author of the work?

a) Tennessee Williams   b) Arthur Miller   c) John Proctor   d) Dr. Seuss

Fuuuccckkk. None of the above? I don’t know. I mean: duh, it’s not Dr. Seuss. I hate it when teachers pull that shit. They think it’s funny and helpful to throw a joke answer in there, but that doesn’t change the fact that it’s, like, patronizing as fuck. We’re not idiots, you bitch.

Maybe I would have actually read the damn play if at the end of last class, she had actually reminded us that we were having a bitch-ass test today. I mean, what kind of sick bitch tells you a week in advance that you’re having a test, but doesn’t take two retarded seconds out of her day to say, Don’t forget to study for the dumb-fuck we’re having next time!

The nerve.

What hand-made gift does Mary offer to Elizabeth in Act Two?

a) a voodoo doll    b) a supposed olive branch   c) a poppet   d) all of the above

What the shit-dick is a poppet? Oh, I’m sorry, Mrs. Bitch, did you forget how to spell “puppet”? I’m gonna say that do her. I’m gonna stand up, walk over to her, slap the test on the desk, point my finger to “poppet”, and ask her if she’s retarded.

A fire alarm starts screaming right before I was gonna do it.

Everyone stands up and Mrs. Bitch says, “Okay, hold on everybody, let’s stay calm and exit in a single file.”

In the halls it literally smells like smoke. And I’m like, hell yeah. It’s like God finally got his shit together.

Outside, everyone’s split off into their stupid little groups except for me, and then firetrucks start showing up. Then another class gets out and I can see Wendell coming toward me, grinning his ass off.

“What’s tickling your balls, asshole?” I give him a fist bump and then he looks from side-t0-side.

“Let’s go behind the old gym. Like in stealth mode, bro.”

On the way, he tells me that a week ago I mentioned I had that stupid test, and he remembered because it was the same day as his math test.

“At first, I was like, fuck it, ya know. I figured I’d just get the hall pass and pull an alarm. But then the next day, I was like, no way, that’ll be so obvious. So I thought since my brother is in town, he might do it for me. And he was like, ‘Pulling an alarm will buy you 15 to 30 minutes tops. If you want to be out of school for the whole day, you gotta set a fire.’ So I ended up paying him 35 bucks to swing by the school, all incognito, and set a fire in the fucking library dude!”

“That’s the coolest fucking thing I’ve ever heard in my life, man!”

“Nah, this is: I’ve got a fuck-ton of paint thinner in my back pack and you’ve just been elected to huff it with me.”

“Dude! Best day ever!”

All of a sudden, I’m hugging him. I don’t even remember doing it. I guess I just haven’t been this happy in a really, really, really long time.

Wendell pushes me away and said, “Don’t touch me, faggot!”

“Don’t call me ‘faggot’, queer!”

We do this for a while until we’re not best friends anymore. I threaten to tell everyone what him and his brother did. And then he says if I do that, then he’s gonna tell everyone that I’m a fag and that I hugged him. We agree that we’ll both stay quiet, and then he goes off to huff paint thinner without me. I wish I had a gun.

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“The usual,” Marvin and Frinkle said. And then both tried to act fast, saying, “Jinks! You owe me a Shasta Cola!”

The two shared a polite laugh, and Esther threw up in her mouth and then swallowed it.

“I guess I’ll be buying Frinkle a Shasta Cola,” said Marvin.

“And I suppose I’m buying Marvin a Shasta Cola of his own,” said Frinkle.

Esther left before Marvin and Frinkle shared another cordial giggle, and then returned afterward with two Shasta Colas.

“Thanks, Esther. Now, Frinkle, where did we leave off last time?”

“Criminy, I don’t know. Something stupid like the meaning of life or something equally as presumptuous, I’m sure.”

“Oh, yes, let’s talk about that. The meaning of life will do just fine.”

“Come off it, Marv.”

“Come off what, Frink? I think it’s something worth talking about. It’s a little out there, sure. But it’s almost recklessly large in scope, so why not?”

“Because then we’ll be a couple of frogs.”

“Look at us, Frinkle. We’re getting old, we’re comfortably poor, and we talk all day long – we’re already a couple of frogs. Go one, tell me: what’s the meaning of life?”

“Nonono: this is your big topic of the day. The Meaning of Life by Marvin. Go.”

“Alright, lets see: I’d like to think the meaning of life is something both unknown, but also somehow always known, you know? Like something wordless, cosmic, and inherent in all things – all materials of the universe. In every subpart of every thing. And in all the subparts of every subpart. Something that’s fuckin’ huge in one sense and beyond microscopic in another.”

A dish breaks somewhere ,and Esther wakes up and wanders into the kitchen.

“Scale it back a little, Marvin.”

“Okay, okay: it’s not that I think there’s a God in any conventional sense of the word – not like some king of the clouds or nothing – but, yes, I think there’s something out there that’s larger than us.”

“Like an elephant?”

“Suck on a rock, you son of a toilet.”

“Marv: scale it back.”

“Ah, Christ. Okay, the point of life is to-”

Marvin stalled to smile at Esther.

“The Early Bird Special for you,” Esther mumbled moistly to Marvin, and then set down his plate of: bacon, two eggs sunny-side-up, a biscuit with gravy, a side of hash browns, and texas toast with a slice of American cheese sort-of melted on top. “And the number four for you.” Esther coughed, burped, hiccuped, then coughed again before finally setting down Frinkle’s place of: four cigarettes, four matches, and an ashtray.

“Thanks, Esther,” said Frinkle, a cigarette already in his mouth. He struck the match, lit the cigarette, inhaled, said, “Alright, she’s gone – tell me the point of life”, and exhaled.

“The point is to grow, to learn as much as you can about yourself and the whole experience of life as possible. While! While knowing full well that you’ll never know everything.”

“Oh yeah?” Frinkle blew a beam of smoke at Marvin as he was sprinkling hot sauce on his eggs. “To what end?”

“Are you kidding me? To the end. Death.”

“And what’s the meaning of death?”

“Death is… life.”

“Christ.”

“Alright, hang on a minute.” Marvin dipped a piece of bacon in egg yoke and then in gravy, took a bite, and pushed his eyebrows together as she chewed. “Right, okay, so the point of death is making way for new life. It’s letting everything you’ve learned and felt be added to the whole fabric of everything. It’s about your body becoming one with the earth and your soul becoming one with the universe.”

Stamping out the cigarette in the ashtray, Frinkle should his head slowly, and lit another.

“What?” Marvin asked this with an edge in his voice, punctuated by clink-dropping his fork onto his plate. “Am I not ‘scaling back’ enough for you? Huh? How about you try taking a shot? Go ahead, Frinki-dink, what’s the meaning of life?”

“It is what it is, Marvin. Ain’t no meaning to it.”

“Very wise words, you old frog. Care to elaborate?”

“Not really.”

Frinkle smoked in silence save for sound of Marvin’s silverware cutting food into bites and almost chipping the plate beneath.

“Okay!” Marvin stopped dividing his eggs. “Tell me, what’s the point of life to a guy like you?”

“Oh, pretty much the same as what you said. Point is doing whatever you got to do, thinking whatever you got to think… to just… get through the damn thing.”

Marvin thought on this while wearing the face of someone who had to sniff excrement like doing so was his job. Frinkle used the cigarette he was smoking to light the next one on his plate, then slid the last one behind his ear and pocketed the extra matches.

Esther came by with the check and wiped spit from her chin before grunting and asking, “Either of you boys got an extra kidney you ain’t using? Also, are either of you in the market for a new one?”

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