The Rain That Bathes the World Page 2

Azaleas

  Ninety-nine degrees and sixty percent humidity can turn a mind that already has romantic tendencies into a factory of melodramatic, poetical nonsense.

  That's me.

  With the water hose.

  And the farmer's tan.

  Standing in the midst of a group of azaleas.

  Everything's a circle. The azaleas convert the carbon dioxide into oxygen. Carbon dioxide from the SUVs of the commuters who drive to work to acquire a disposable income. Oxygen that keeps the commuters breathing. Commuters who buy the azaleas with their disposable income. Azaleas that convert carbon dioxide into oxygen.

  I pause, wiping the sweat from my brow with a sweatier forearm. The heat doesn't bother me. The hunger does. It's almost two in the afternoon, and I still haven't eaten lunch. Probably won't for another forty-five minutes.

  One day, I won't work here anymore. One day, Haybridge Garden Center will just be nostalgia.

  I'll go to college.

  I'll get a degree.

  I'll become a commuter.

  A commuter who buys the azaleas that keep him alive. The azaleas that pay for the tuition that will transform a garden center grunt into a commuter.

  I'm still watering the azaleas.

  Millions of people in countries I'll never visit are dying of thirst.

  I'm pouring gallon after gallon of water onto organic lawn ornaments that don't have souls.

  God bless America.

  My walkie-talkie squawks. The Boss is calling me to the outdoor cash register.

  I close the valve on the watering wand, let it clatter to the blacktop. I start walking, the damp leaves of the azaleas painting my legs as I fight my way out of their midst. They don't want me to leave.

  A sweaty customer in a V-neck shirt demands the price of a gardenia. He looks like he smells bad.

  I smile--customers like it when I do that--and answer his question.

  He frowns and leaves for the Home Depot.

  Another small business dies.

  The Economy gets worse.

  The commuters head for the unemployment line.

  I keep walking.

  I'm skirting the edge of the first greenhouse when Ruth pops out from behind a group of cypress trees. She still has that look of abject confusion chiseled into her pug-like face, her blonde butch haircut matted against her sunburnt forehead, her arms swinging like fire hoses as she scurries towards me.

  Ruth.

  I can't stand Ruth.

  In the two months she's been working here, Ruth has been nothing but a thorn in my side. All she ever does is complain about her pathetic workload, voice her various insecurities about anything and everything, and ask me where plants are.

  Two weeks ago, she let three tables of geraniums die. Job security is not in her vocabulary.

  She is running scared. The sky is falling. The world is ending. Help me, I'm a victim.

  She called my name.

  "Yes, Ruth?"

  She flings a flabby arm in the direction of an elderly couple a hundred yards away, wisely keeping their distance. “I have a couple with me who are looking for clematis. Can you--”

  “In the back against the fence.”

  “Thank you!”

  “You’re welcome.”

  Apparently, my tone leaves much to be desired.

  “Are you mad at me?”

  Yes.

  Yes!

  YES!

  “No, I’m not mad you.”

  “Ok, I wasn’t sure.”

  She shuffles back to the unlucky patrons, sucking air in giant gulps from the exertion.

  When is she going to get fired?

  I splash through a strand of puddles created by two hoses that didn't connect right. There was a time when I avoided puddles--out of respect for my shoes--but now I don't care. I am the King of this place, and I am bulletproof. Nothing can touch me.

  Except the Boss. Of course.

  He stands next to the ugly box of plywood and awning that houses the outdoor cash register, guzzling from a can of Diet Coke, his meaty fingers threatening to crush the aluminum into a tiny ball of matter that will never decompose. He is short and round, with skin so perennially abused by ultra-violet rays that it's hard to tell where the epidermis ends and the melanoma begins. I often wonder what sort of picture could be created if I connected all the sun spots on his bald head.

  Probably something with fangs.

  A pudgy twenty-something with ghostly skin--the kind you get from playing endless hours of MMO-RPGs in your mother’s basement--and a head of greasy curls stands next to him, glancing around nervously, shifting his weight from one foot to the other.

  I swear under my breath.

  This again.

  I've seen this episode before. I didn't like it then. I don't like it now.

  The Boss tosses the empty can into a trash bin. “This is Luke. He’ll be working with us now. I need you to show him the ropes.”

  I mechanically shake Luke's hand. Hi, nice to meet you. I just lied. This is a fake smile. This is not my real personality. I am a fraud who makes minimum wage.

  His hand felt like a sweaty lump of Play-Doh. Luke has no idea how expendable he is.

  I show him around the garden center. These are the annuals. These are the perennials. These bushes are deciduous. These bushes aren't. These are the evergreens. This is the gun to put in your mouth when you finally snap.

  Oh, wait. You won't be here long enough for that. My mistake.

  I take Luke to a group of hawthorn bushes baking on the blacktop. I show him how to water them. Then I abandon him.

  A plane flies by overhead. I look up. The commuters are taking a business trip.

  I wonder if the Wright brothers knew what they were doing that day at Kitty Hawk, what they had created when Orville took off on December 17, 1903.

  Man can now fly. What does He do with it?

  Bombers destroying London.

  Bombers dumping napalm on Vietnam.

  Passenger jets crashing into the World Trade Center.

  The Knowledge of Good and Evil.

  The Tree in the Garden.

  The trees that keep the commuters alive.

  The trees I still have to water.

  Back to the azaleas.