Armistice Day: Kurt Milberger

The day before the party, Arthur stopped at the Men’s Warehouse and purchased a new suit. The tailor ran a flexible ruler up his arm length, around the radius of his chest up under his armpits, up the long outside length of his legs, around his belt, and even up the narrow crevice of his inseam. Arthur picked a subtle pin-striped, charcoal suit and a maroon tie with pocket square to match. He waited in the shop while the tailor adjusted the suit and nipped off the errant threads. “Things happen quickly now a days,” Arthur said when the tailor told him the alterations could be done in a matter of minutes, perhaps as long as a half an hour.

While he waited Arthur perused the other ties, the lavenders and yellows, the patterned and the solid colored. He lingered over the shiny shoes, their surfaces reflecting his face in flashes like the surface of a dark lake. When he tried on the finished product, admiring himself in the mirror and playfully tugging at the lapels of his new, fitted suit jacket, the tailor said, “Looking sharp, Mr. Erikson. Looking very sharp.”

“Thank you,” Arthur said. “I’m attending an Armistice Day celebration tomorrow.”

“Armistice day?” He was a very young man, for a tailor.

“Yes,” Arthur said. “To commemorate the end of the first World War. Surely you’ve heard of it. Peace after all those years of trench warfare?” Arthur thought of the mud and blood, the sound of machine guns hammering. His grandfather had served in the Great War, but Arthur never wore a uniform. His concept of the war came from documentaries he enjoyed watching on public television. The grainy black and white footage, the monotone narration, the war in one hour segments.

The tailor only nodded. “I didn’t know anyone celebrated that anymore,” he said. “That will be nice, I’m sure.”

“I think I’ll need a boutonniere,” Arthur said. “To complete the ensemble.”

On his way home from the tailor’s, Arthur stopped into a florist’s called “Fresh Buds” and purchased a single, dark red rose to adorn his new suit at the Armistice Day celebration. The rose came in a plastic container shaped like an over-sized gemstone. Arthur stored it in his refrigerator next to his carton of orange juice, and he hung the suit from its hanger on the clothing hook attached to the back of his bedroom door.

Nothing would happen between him and Melinda the next day, but Arthur was prepared for anything. He fell asleep thinking about Melinda’s smile, though he did not mean to.

____

Arthur tried to live a full life. He surrounded himself with beautiful things like potted lilies, chrysanthemums, and violets that he tended on the patio attached to his apartment. The walls of his room were decorated with pleasant paintings in shades of yellow and pink and purple painted by artists that Arthur didn’t know. The paintings put him in mind of pleasant things like late spring and early summer days, warm breezes. He often sat at his breakfast table with a buttered English muffin, a glass of orange juice, a half a cup of coffee and the Variety section of the Sunday newspaper. He saved up the Variety section and savored it throughout the course of the week, reading a little each morning, and looking out the window into the courtyard at the center of his apartment complex. Often distracted from his breakfast and morning reading by the busy flitters of a robin or a jay or a wren, though the robin with its thick auburn breast was far and away his favorite. These occupations, the paintings, the paper, the bird watching, satisfied Arthur, pleased him, and he was consequently very happy.

____

This story does not end with disillusionment. Arthur will not awake one morning to discover the misery and futility of it all, the empty cardboard carton of orange juice, the stupid inconsequential birds on their barren twigs, another in a lifelong string of bland English muffins, and end the day in his porcelain bathtub, pink water pouring over the rim, his wrists gashed into bloody blossoms.

____

Arthur’s apartment is a modest two bedroom plus den located in the lavish Trout Court apartment complex. He’s decorated with tasteful contemporary furniture, sleek angles and smooth earth tone surfaces, the walls adorned with the nature paintings that remind him of the outdoors. Arthur tends to his patio gardens in the evenings after his job at the accounting firm, Werner & Sons, and on the weekends he enjoys a game of community cards, usually bridge but sometimes poker, in the Trout Court party room.

In addition to its community amenities (the glistening blue swimming pool, a weight room, free wireless internet access—though Arthur has no interest in bringing a computer into his home—and a sheltered parking garage), Trout Court employs a young woman named Melinda to coordinate weekend activities and special events for the residents. One fourth of July, for example, Melinda decorated the picnic tables in the courtyard with red, white, and blue tablecloths, hung streamers from the low branches of the maple trees, stuck plastic flags into the ground and acquired a few boxes of fireworks for all the residents to have a party. It was a grand affair with food and friends and patriotic music. Arthur wore his best white shoes, blue blazer, and a crisp pair of khaki pants. There were hotdogs, bratwurst, beer, wine coolers, and even root beer floats. Arthur spoke mostly to Melinda and Bill, the man from the unit below his. At the end of the evening, everyone lit off fireworks. Arthur gazed at the fountains of yellow and orange sparks spewing from cardboard tubes and stared in awe at the grand explosions in the sky. Children from the complex ran screaming through the courtyard firing balls of flame from roman candles and tossing pop snaps onto the cement sidewalks. The older kids exploded firecrackers in great bundles that rattled like machine guns in war movies. And then Melinda handed out sparklers to all the residents. She brought one to Arthur, who was sitting on a picnic table watching the festivities (and keeping his shoes pristine). “Would you like to do a sparkler with me?” she asked holding up the two sticks, one in each hand.

“Of course I would,” he said.

“Here.” She handed him one of the sticks. “Let me help you light it.”

Then Melinda set her unlit sparkler down on the picnic table and drew a lighter from the pocket of her jeans. Arthur extended his hand and, to steady the sparkler, Melinda wrapped her soft hand around his. She held his sparker in the lighter’s flame. For a moment, they sat there together while in flickering light, each one holding the end of the sparkler and holding the other’s hand while the sparkler flickered and popped.

Melinda celebrated her wedding anniversary two weeks later without a thought about Arthur.

____

This story does not end with a murder. No jealous husband is going to kick down the door of Arthur’s apartment to shove the twin barrels of a shotgun into his mouth. He will not come across a murdered prostitute on his way to work one day, nor will he grab Melinda by the hair or throat. He will not carry a semi-automatic weapon into his workplace and displace the internal organs and fluids of his coworkers. This story does not end in psychosis. Arthur will not find himself pushed to the breaking point.

____

When he wasn’t tending to his garden or working at the accounting firm, where he derived an intense, intellectual pleasure from combining and recombining numbers, or attending community events organized by Melinda, Arthur liked to take tours.

He’d visited the local history museum nearly a dozen times. He’d toured the houses of deceased local celebrities like Ronald B. Johnson, who’d made a fortune in the Pork industry, and Harriet Jones, who’d been a distinguished educator in a one room school house where she also lived. He’d been on walking tours of the city’s many floral gardens, notable sites, and historic trails. He’d seen countless notable landmarks, each one distinguished by a brass plaque set in marble or granite with raised lettering to explain its placement and importance. Arthur read every word and often thought, “Interesting,” before he let the information pass out of his mind like a birdsong.

There was too much death and destruction, adversity and failure, even in a small city. Local history, even the successes, distracted and depressed Arthur too much for him to keep his mind focused on the plaques for very long. He read them, noted their importance, paid his due respect with a slow nod of his head, and then walked down the trails to the next important moments of history already forgetting the agony of the last.

He preferred domestic history. He kept in mind the games people played to divert themselves from ordinary rainy days one hundred years ago, he looked closely at the utensils used to bake antique cakes and pies and he thought of weddings, birthdays, and other celebrations. He inspected old clothes in glass cases, and he especially liked the outfits worn to festivities. Tuxedos and dresses, gowns and simple outfits. Once, in the preserved home of an elusive steel magnate, he lingered over the wedding dress the man’s wife had worn, and he was filled with joy by the tiny sequin sparkles and beads sewn onto it in floral patterns. He traced the trails of lace with his eyes. In the light, they reminded him of ground woven spider webs draped over blades of grass, how they caught the dew overnight and seemed to glow in the morning sun. He stood before the dress for some fifteen minutes. Then smiled and walked on.

____

Arthur will not become insane, slowly or otherwise. He will not eat a dog after killing it with his bare hands, the orange blood dried in smears on his cheeks and chin. A team of investigators won’t break into Arthur’s apartment to discover his possessions in a tumult and the occupant, one Arthur E. Erikson, stripped down to his underwear, squatted in a pile of his own feces, dining of his neighbor’s limb while wearing the pelt of his cat, Bellcurve, upon his head like the hat of Daniel Boone.

____

Returning to his apartment with three plastic bags full of his groceries for the week: a gallon of milk, a bag of oranges, two pounds of ground beef, a dozen English muffins, two cartons of eggs, and all the necessary ingredients for his favorite sandwich (ham and Swiss on pumpernickel with mustard, one slice of fresh tomato and caraway seeds), Arthur discovered Melinda hanging flyers.

On his apartment door she’d hung a flyer with “Celebrate! Armistice Day!” printed on it in thick red, white and blue letters. “Hello there, Melinda,” Arthur said as he set his bags on the floor and dug into his pockets for the keys. The flyer on his door obscured the brass numbers that identified his apartment, number 337.

“Oh Arthur! Hi!” Melinda looked away from the flyer she’d just taped up and waved the handful of leftover flyers at him. “Just canvassing the complex, as I like to say.”

Arthur looked at the letters and graphics printed on the flyer taped to his door. Two ships shooting off fireworks, a boy and a girl playing with a kite, and a Civil War cannon beside a pile of cannon balls. Next to the cannon, a large cake twinkling with candles. He’d never heard of anyone celebrating Armistice Day, but any excuse to spend time with Melinda filled him with a warm bubbly feeling. “Looks like a good time,” he said. Beneath the pictures were the words, “Family & Friends, Food & Fun, Freedom & Peace!” with the promise of “Drinks and Chow to be Provided.”

Melinda laughed. “A little pre-Thanksgiving warm up. Of course, I don’t usually plan much for the winter holidays because people spend so much time with their families.” Arthur kept his eyes on the flyer. “I suppose you’ll be visiting family for Thanksgiving?”

Arthur thought of his sister and her husband in Seattle. He spoke to her on the twenty-second of every month, but hadn’t seen her in person since their mother died. His father, too, was deceased, and Arthur spends most of his holidays with the television. Not that the arrangement bothered him: he had little patience for small children (of which his sister had three) and he enjoyed the holiday programming, especially the parade with its bulbous floats and flying confetti. “I imagine I’ll be staying home,” he said. “How about you?”

“Oh, we’re going to my husband’s parents’ in North Dakota—” she said “North Dakota” in four enormous syllables and tossed her head from side-to-side, her blond hair swinging around her neck. “They’re great people.”

“I didn’t realize you were married.” Arthur stammered.

“Oh yeah,” Melinda said and lifted up her hand to display her enormous diamond ring.

“Over five years now.”

“That’s wonderful,” Arthur said.

She giggled and scrunched her shoulders up to her neck. “Guess I better get back to the grind,” she said, waving the flyers at him.

Arthur tucked the flyer under his arm and stooped to pick up his grocery bags. He turned to smile at Melinda before entering the apartment, but she had turned to tape a flyer to the next door and didn’t notice him looking at her. “I’ll see you at the party,” he said to her back.

“I can’t wait,” she called over her shoulder with genuine excitement in her voice.

Arthur took his grocery bags and entered his apartment alone.

____

This story does not end with a romance. Melinda and Arthur aren’t going to come together at the Armistice Day party and hold hands like they did on the Fourth of July. That didn’t mean anything. Arthur isn’t going to sweep her off her feet and into his neat apartment where they’ll make love like careful, caring teenagers. He lingering over the soft curves of her torso, she opening her mouth to kiss him. They will not have a four scene courtship, an illicit extramarital affair, that ends at an alter in a blossoming wedding dress and a sharp tuxedo.

Melinda’s husband is a man named Charles who does manual labor in the refrigerator/freezer assembly plant on the east side of town. Charles likes to drink coffee out of his thermos because he likes the way the steam swirls from the opening. If Charles knew about Arthur’s budding crush on Melinda, he would not believe it was real or he would laugh at the dear old fellow’s foolishness. Charles crushes his cigarette butts between his thumb and middle finger.

There are other things that won’t be happening in Arthur’s story. He won’t experience many random acts (of violence or kindness). He will not trip someday on his way home from the office and freakishly break his head open on a cement road partition. He will not be accidentally killed in a convenience store robbery gone wrong, nor will he be the one tragic fatality when some heavy and jagged cargo falls out of a plane passing overhead and tumbles to earth.

Similarly, no one will ever stop Arthur on the street to tell him how attractive his new hair cut makes him look. He will not arrive at his car someday to find an envelope under the windshield wiper blade full of green green money, and his sister won’t suddenly decide to encourage him to move to Seattle so he can be nearer her family. This is Arthur’s life. The most he can hope for is that it will persist, each day blooming into the next, a new English muffin, a glass of orange juice, half a cup of coffee. Another chance to look out the window and trace the robin’s path as it weaves between the branches of the fanning maple trees. He can look forward to the Armistice Day party—another chance to gaze upon Melinda, maybe eat too much potato salad or Jello-O—to break up the series of days and the patterns of numbers that make up Arthur’s life.

The truth is, he is no more or less happy at this moment than anyone else, he is no more or less advantaged or endowed—intellectually, financially or otherwise—and he is no more or less ambitious. Arthur’s story cannot end in a crescendo of cymbals and blaring trumpets, nor can it end in an explosion of black smoke and orange flame. It can only be a series of ellipses always indicating something more, but never something worth mentioning. Until the final period.

____

One would expect Arthur to die peacefully in his sleep, but instead he’ll suffer a stroke and collapse onto the narrow linoleum floor of his apartment’s kitchen. The TV on in the background. The stroke or the impact will cause his nose to bleed and by the time the landlord (on Melinda’s suspicions) opens the apartment to check on his most reliable tenant, Arthur’s body will be bloated with the liquids festering inside of it and the blood around his nostrils will have dried into a black crust. Melinda will organize the Trout Court presence at Arthur’s funeral, and his neighbors and coworkers will talk about how pleasant and unimposing he was, how—if you got to know him—he had a lot of interesting things to say about nature and history and politics, and how he absolutely loved birds. Especially robins. The casket will descent slowly into Arthur’s new plot of land and the observers will drift away, each one slightly puzzled by the feeling of peace and contentment brought up by Arthur’s funeral. As if not really knowing him allowed them to see the death for what it was, a peaceful transition into life’s final, mysterious, and eternal stage. Gone from a life lived peacefully and without excessive suffering.

____

Picture Arthur on that morning, the morning of the Armistice Day party. His head filled with thoughts of resolution and peace. His mind awash with images of Melinda’s cheery smile, and—even if she did have a husband—the hope that, as long as she worked at Trout Court, she would be an acquaintance, even a friend of his, and hey, you never know. Arthur rises from bed and showers, puts on his deodorant and combs his graying hair. He skips breakfast to have a little extra room for the food at the party. He brushes his teeth, forty-seven strokes per side, and dabs his neck, just below the jawbone, with cool aftershave. He pulls a white undershirt over his head, a pair of white briefs up his legs and a long pair of dress socks almost up to his knees. Then he removes the suit from its hanger and lays the individual pieces out on his bed. They are perfect, not a single errant thread, not a crooked seam or pinstripe and not a stain on them. He takes them from the bed one by one and dresses himself before the long mirror affixed to his closet door. He patiently ties his tie and tucks his pocket square into the pocket. Then Arthur goes to the refrigerator and removes the plastic gem. In the bathroom, before the mirror again, he opens the container and removes the rose. Despite its time off the stem, the rose is still firm and fragrant. Arthur fixes it to his lapel with the long, pearl tipped, stick pin the florist included, and, before adjusting his coat, pulls the rose up to his nose for a quick whiff. It does not occur to him that the rose has been dead for hours, that it will fall to pieces over the course of the day. He thinks only, “Lovely,” before straightening his coat, inspecting his visage in the mirror with a smile and stepping out to meet the day, embrace the party, and to see Melinda.