Ol' Mike Kelly

 

 

    I gazed out into the brush, now blue by the moonlight, I could hear the coyotes working themselves up into a frenzy over a kill. It was likely another rabbit, as we found the remains of one of the unlucky ones the night before when the pack had ventured too close to camp.  The moon hovered in the sky like a distant light at the end of an endless tunnel. I took a glance around the camp at respectable men gathering water to drown out their campfires. Some of the less respected men who composed themselves as regalities had long since retired at an increasingly appropriate hour, leaving their underage wild children around a small campfire pretending that they hadn’t pilfered some booze from a cousin or older brother.  I walked the camp meeting the eyes of parents and children, assuring them that their fears of the boisterous packs outside the camp posed them little danger, and assuring them that they’d have to go through me to get anywhere close to their tents. “I’m scarier than most of the creatures lurkin out there in the dark” Somehow that line endeared me to children, that they could accept that I was a monster but I belonged on their side.    I made my way back around to the communal area where we met each morning for prayers and basked in the enlightenment of the Word of God. Usually, it was three hours of bearded men huddled around a doctrine taking turns shaking scriptures at it much like you’d find vagrants in an ally throwing dice.  Some were there to flash their wealth of knowledge, and some others trying to glean a nugget of wisdom or two.  I was all in for the prayers, but the meetings were admittedly a bit much for me.  The sound of the granite gravel clenching about eight paces behind me caught my attention causing me to turn. There, was an older man donning a pair of unseasonable blue shorts, never fashionable white socks with black sandals, a well-traveled fanny pack, a grey commemorative t-shirt and a hat from what I believe was the John Birch Society adorned with several 2nd amendment pins. I always admired the Thompson machine gun pin myself. “HEY- O, You GONNA be A-round here in the next TEN minutes!?” He half shouted in a whisper. “For you Mike, I’ll be sure to, what’s up?” I asked. “ I’ve GOT something for US!” he exclaimed with exuberant anticipation, as he scuttled off in a shifting trajectory.  I took a seat at one of the mesh picnic tables and glanced around the camp noting most the fires were out, even the secret moonshiners club were smart enough to move their stolen beers to the family tent. My eyes tried to count the stars but even they were hard to see around the moons halo. “ DO YOU like Tequila?” Michael said returning with his hands full. He set a bottle of brown liquid in a bottle that resembled an upside down wine glass. “ I ALSO got a SMOKED BEEF Log” his enthusiasm was infectious. In that moment I don’t think that there was anything he’d rather be doing than sitting with a night watchman slicing bits of light snacks while drinking tequila, this was after all mentioned in relation to the feast of tabernacles.  This had become a tradition of ours year after year after I had impressed him with an offering from a Samuel Adams variety pack.  Every year after the rest of the church went to sleep, Michael Kelly and I would drink and I would listen to him talk about life. He’d tell me of his prospects in the mining business and a plan that he was working on to find investors for a project.  I remember the first thing he’d ever said to me was “Thank you.”  Back when our church would meet in a rough neighborhood I’d open carry a sidearm. It was legal in Arizona to do so and you’d see it every now and again. One of the wives of a musician was in a fuss about it, asking everyone except me if it was real and it made a disturbance. Mike looked me in the eyes and said “Thank you. Thank you for being responsible and caring enough about your safety and mine”  It stuck with me that my bearded friend looked at me with respect for doing the right thing, even though some people didn’t understand it.   We drank and laughed and kept watch over the camp until late in the morning, he’d tell me stories about his former wife, until he’d get a little too buzzed and stagger off to camp in his car. Sometimes he’d have a laser thermometer that he’d pull out of his car for some aspect of the mining. “I SWEAR sometimes I CAN take the TEMPERATURE ON THE MOON if it’s clear” he’d say laughing and tightening his lower jaw. We’d sip a beer or two and he’d point that thing at someone making their way to the bathroom and take their temperature before and after. I laughed at how it made my friend laugh.     Just months before I was leaving to move here Mike Kelly and I grabbed a pizza at a place he had a coupon for and he was really excited about.  “We’ll have to do this again sometime soon, maybe when you come back to visit” He said “Sure, Mike, that would be cool” I casually replied, knowing that if I came back, i’d probably be too busy to squeeze any time out for my old drinking buddy from church. I said it anyway, because I wanted the words to be true, I intended to mean them. About three months after I made my way across the country I heard word that Mike had died. My drinking friend had drifted on. Out here I drive out in the darkness, and I look up at the heavy moonlight. I listen to the wind in the trees and I think of places that I’ve been and who I was with, and who I was with them. I still find myself somewhere between the people laughing in the darkness, and the dogs barking in the night.