Chapter 6. At the duck pond

Damn, thought Jefferson Jones, absinthe is good.

The hallucinatory aspect of absinthe is overblown, of course, and the absinthe high is not so much about tripping balls but euphoric colors. Absinthe allows the controlled and attentive to shape elements of the outside world into any form.

For the self-denying melancholic Jefferson Jones, the Bethany-shaped and Jennifer-shaped holes in the very space around him coalesce into Bethany and Jennifer. And Etta, always Etta.

Jones felt cruel for imprisoning the beautiful memories in this world – though no qualms about trapping them in his wormwooded mind – and so let their forms dissolve...

...dissolving to form pages at his feet, pages of the forever unfinished works of Jefferson Jones. There were whole chapters Being Jefferson Jones and She, America, Gone. Here at his feet, a couplet from The Trip; at the periphery of his vision to the left, scene two of My Six Ex-Wives.

•••••

The duckpond. Ever curiously shaped (a Maryland Atlantic University legend has it that opinion on the pond’s design was equally divided, with half favoring an ovular shape and the other half preferring a meandering trail setup; the two designs were combined to form something that in form resembled a kidney stuffed with a generous portion of lower intestine), meticulously kept, and located dead center on campus, this spot had served as stage to tens of thousands of romantic dramas through the decades.

Hell, Jefferson Jones himself’d had a couple.

He proposed to Bethany here and half and hour later attempted to soothe the inconsolable woman with reassurances that the second Mrs. Jones would be no less significant than the first.

And his third marriage had essentially ended here. He’d tried to fan the flames with an ego-centered road trip to old stomping grounds, only to be quashed in a dreary cold characteristic Maryland rain – she’d known it would be the end then.

With absinthe, you don’t so much as trip balls as give rise to living memory.

•••••

Jefferson Jones feels the giggly days of college so far behind as to be another lifetime, and he doesn’t like how everything is uncomfortable remembering.

He takes another sip from the flask.

•••••

Maybe i should call Etta, he thinks and backs down with a mental no, no, no.

He had promised himself ages ago he’d never try to call her while he was drunk.

Does that mean I’m drunk? Oh god, figured Jefferson Jones, maybe some.

He draws a long draw, licks his licorice-infused lips, looks down lazily and sees the fox standing by his feet.

“Nice day for a little conceptualism, don’t you think?” asked the fox. “By the way, my name’s Abélard.”

Damn, thought Jefferson Jones, absinthe is too good.