sARDINES sOUSED iN oIL7*

He never did, the man in the hat’s father, like fish, or roe, or fish cakes fried in Crisco. He hated the smell of cog oil and grease, and the high frequency whine of an engine revved out of neutral, and cods’ liver and dashboards with sharp curses in the molding. He disliked truck doors that wouldn’t shut properly, and windows taped over with plastic, and the reek of his father’s sweat, his shirts starched with vinegar and Old Spice. He hated all these things, and more; a hatred that left no room for resolution or forgiveness. He hated having to drive round with his father on a crate in the Mercury fish truck, and the door that wouldn’t shut properly, and the passenger’s side window that was taped up and flapped whenever his father stomped on the gas peddle. But most of all he hated fish, and crustaceans, shrimp and crayfish, and smelts and sardines soused in oil, and the strained look on his father’s face when he over-steered and had to pull hard on the wheel to keep the truck from cobbling and careening and kilting like mad. The man in the hat’s father hated most things, but never once did he complain in public, or dress down his father for being a lousy driver. Not once, not ever.

The man in the hat saw the shamble leg man one day, his leg, the shamble legged man’s leg, cursing the pavement like a scream. It reminded him, the shamble leg man’s leg, of a votive candle, the wick knotted into a rosary, a penitent’s drag anchor, rankle with fester and blain. They were the same, but not the same, cut from the same cloth, but with different scissors; the man in the hat was cut out with pinking shears, the shamble leg man with a child’s blunt edged scissors, the kind that leave rounded ends and corners.