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“We are not in Flushing, therefore, the Watkins Glen rule that the driver picks the music is in force. Please, simply sit there and enjoy the choices. Truly, they are most relaxing and God knows we both need to destress.”
“I’m fine. Not stressed at all,” he muttered and fell silent. Ah, the beauty of Chopin in a quiet car. We pulled out of the parsonage drive, letting two older women speed walking to pass behind us, and then headed toward the chalet.
“Don’t forget to stop at the Fill ’Er Up for a burrito. I love them there. Sure, people say not to eat stuff from gas stations, but I say why live in fear. I ain’t never had a bad episode from any gas station food, but then again my stomach is made out of cast iron.”
Oh Lord, he’s off and running again. It was only three minutes of quietude. Three. How could one person have so much to say?! I refuse to engage. If I stay silent, he will understand and fall into a peaceful quiet.
“…a couple of years ago. He made it back onto the turnpike before the cramps set in. We had to pull over so he could dash into the woods to make like a bear.”
I pulled up to a stop sign, resolute in my vow not to say a word to the man.
“Of course, that was the beginning of his problems. When he dropped and squatted, his ass brushed up against some poison sumac. The next three days, we had to help him apply calamine to his asshole and balls. I never seen a man in such dire straits in my life. My cousin Vito, who was driving, laughed so hard that week I thought he was going to rupture something. ?Course a month later he did have to get that hernia taken care of, so maybe all that laughter over his brother’s pink balls did deviate his guts more. I take care of my guts, and my balls, because both are important. You ever get poison sumac on your nuts?” I slowly looked his way. “What? Too personal? Yeah, could be I stepped over a line of protocol. Sorry. I get to talking, and hey! There’s the gas station. Oh nice, they’re having a sale on fruit slushies. You want one? They’re good. I like the purple passion fruit ones myself, but if you want something else, just say so.”
“No, thank you, I’m fine. I had my breakfast.” I pulled off the main drag onto a side street beside a famous ice cream shop. Parking was always difficult in Watkins Glen on the weekends. And this being a Sunday, slots were hard to locate. I finally found one about a block away from the gas station, in front of a small blue house.
Philip unbuckled his belt and then looked at me questioningly. “You coming?”
“Into the gas station?” I asked as if the thought never entered my mind.
Which it hadn’t. Barnaby did all the mundane things in life for me. He gassed my cars, arranged my clothing, and even drove me to various functions when my vision was bothering me badly. My Stargardt’s Disease was slowly progressing, but I refused to be sidelined until I simply could not drive or read any more. Hopefully that would be many years from now.
Most young people with juvenile macular degeneration, JMD for short, didn’t begin to suffer too terribly until they reached their thirties or forties. I was thirty-two and was noticing some black spots in my central vision, so I left the driving to Barnaby on extremely sunny days or nights. Reading was also becoming affected, which was heartbreaking as I adored losing myself in a good book. I’d been a voracious reader as a child. And I refuse to let this disease get the better of me. Audiobooks were out there and I was building up a nice collection for later. Until then, I wore corrective lenses that made me look like a mad tinkerer from a fantasy roleplaying game. Alone, of course. My secret was mine to keep and keep it I would. Only those closest to me knew. I’d avoided dating for the most part. The majority of men wanted little to do with a partner who would become a burden. And perhaps I was a little vain, but I could not see myself allowing anyone to watch me decline.
Not that I would be able to see myself well at all in a decade or two…
Blurry vision will hide the wrinkles and gray hairs when you look in the mirror. Bright side and all that.
Yes, the bright side. I did my best to live there, but some days it was harder to find the sun than others. Sadly, there’s no cure for juvenile macular degeneration, so it was just a matter of when for those who suffered from it were declared legally blind. Papa and Mama both had carried the mutated gene, but I refused to just give up. I would keep doing as I had, running the winery to the best of my abilities. When I could no longer see, I could call over my cousins from France to take over the daily work. Until then, it would be me, despite my uncle’s worries. Papa had bequeathed this winery to me and I would not abandon her.
We all had our crosses to bear. Mine was not painful. I was able to be productive with visual aids such as bioptic glasses and special assistive apps for my phone and computer to enlarge the print as well as adaptive training courses. It could be worse, I told myself when the stress of slow vision loss kept me up at night, which was quite often. This disease would not kill me. That was something that I would adapt to as well.
“Yeah, come on. It’s too hot to sit in the car. Live a little, Henry.” He gave me that shit-eating grin and then a nudge in the side with his elbow. “I’ll treat for the slushies.”
“Ah, well, if you are buying the slushies…”
He chuckled and exited the car, stopping to talk to some young man jogging past. The neighborhood was middle class for the most part. Once one got off the touristy part of the main drag—away from the shops, boutiques, and eateries—you found a town filled with hardworking people who took pride in their homes. It was when you got to the lake itself that you began to see more expensive houses. Lakeside properties were always high cost. My ninety acre property sat above Seneca Lake on the eastern side and had some wonderful views of the water.
“Okay, Henry, let’s hit up the burritos and the slushies,” Philip called after he was done chatting with a fan of his. I nodded at the young man as he moved off and lowered my sunglasses back to my nose. “My treat!”
I’d never had a breakfast burrito with a side of slushie. Nor was I sure I truly wanted to but something about Philip Greco enticed me to do things I had never done before. That, I was sure, was not a good thing.
Chapter Three
Phil
By the look on Henry’s classically—and not spinet shit classic but Jon Bon Jovi classic—hunky face, the man had never had a breakfast burrito with a slushie chaser for breakfast. I’m not sure a person has even lived if they’ve not had a Fill ’Er Up breakfast. They made the best breakfast burritos in town and I should know because I had made it my quest to search out and sample every breakfast burrito in Watkins Glen. Maybe even the whole of Schuyler County.
“Okay, so if you keep wrinkling your nose at it, it’ll never taste good because your gray matter has made up its mine already,” I stated as we took a seat outside to eat at one of the three little metal tables with bright Fill ’Er Up umbrellas of green and yellow. “You look like staring at it is making your head hurt. Maybe stop glaring and take a bite. The sausage, egg, taters, avocado, and cheese are true NYC bodega beautification.”
Henry sniffed his burrito again, his brows knitted tightly over his dark as shit shades. I’d not seen glasses so dark since I picked up Grandma Rosie after her cataract surgery. Was he trying to be all in the vogue here in the outdoor bistro section of the Fill ’Er Up?
“Pass me the salsa.” He sighed, his forehead still tight.
I handed over the tiny plastic cup of tomato, pepper, onions, and a dash of zip. He turned his back to the sun creeping up to peer at us over the roof of Glen’s Glen Garage, which was where I ordered my new alternator. Glen was an old Gladiator fan. Held season tickets. Even hired me and a few of the guys to shoot commercials for him.
“You may want to go light because Marvin makes that salsa and he does not spare the jalapeño,” I warned my host for the next few weeks. While I wasn’t thrilled to be stuck in Snobbity Hill for who knew how long, my pan self was kind of happy to be able to gaze at the man for a while. Yeah, yeah, it was slightly hypocritical, but damn, the man was fine.
“I enjoy a little bite,” he tossed out blithely and then dipped his burrito into the five alarm salsa. I shrugged and waited. Seemed to be a snooty snoot like Henry would choke and gag once that hot shit hit his refined palate.
