Respectively

My brother-in-law wanted me to post this story. Please do not steal my works, but please do feel free to comment. Thanks!
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Respectively
The story is Emmers, Emmers and a long lost friend of thirty some-odd years, Billy. Actually it was not that long, since he is now only twenty-three and has not seen her in four years. They had lived next to one another in Reedsville, West Virginia for the last eighteen years, were best friends in the friendly sense and never spoke of romance, but lately he had been away thanks to good ole Uncle Sam.
"Sonny, don’t go gettin’ your head shot off." Words of drunken encouragement from his dad. His stout form lay heavily in the stuffed T. V. chair.
Billy’s dad still sat in front of that television, pouring Saranac over an overly filthy undershirt that had not seen a washer since Kennedy was alive. His back toward Alma, who sat cutting coupons that would accumulate until she threw them out, never bothering to grocery shop. Papageorgio’s Pizzaria delivered nightly. Mushroom pizza was for Mondays, while Tuesday was pepperoni, Wednesday was green peppers, Thursday’s pizza was topped with the meats: sausage, beef, steak pieces, and bacon, while Friday was a lively night of Anchovy’s and Pineapple. Saturday evenings Billy’s father spent the evening ‘out with the boys’, or at least that was what Alma was told. He drove his ’70 Nova away from their trailer heading toward town, then doubled back to the highway. He would then sit overlooking Interstate 81, watching the semi’s barrel down the highway. A freedom and rebellion that saturated those huge rigs urged Billy’s father to reach out one evening almost trance-like; he barely caught himself before falling off the overpass. This weekly ritual dated back to 1946, years before Billy had left for the war, shortly after his birth. Camouflaged Things also traveled the interstate occasionally, and Billy’s father dreamt that his son would be among the returning soldiers.
Billy was not among those soldiers, but he was knocking on Emmers’ beach-house door outside of Atlantic City, New Jersey. "Billy!" She was surprised to see him. It had been awhile. Her hair cascaded down her spine, while those once pudgy young girl fingers now held an engagement rock weightily, as she curled her knuckles around the door’s edge.
The early morning sun hallooed Billy, creating a supernatural ambiance. "Hullo Emmers." He spoke as if he dropped her off after the county fair just last evening.
Her eyes shifted up and down his tattered uniform, over mud-caked pantcuffs, resting on tennis-shoed feet the color of mushroom fertilizer and stale cognac. "It's been awhile. How are you?" She answered, glancing over her shoulder as if expecting her fiancé, or worse her fiancé's mother, to materialize in the foyer. Not waiting for an answer, she tried to shut the door only to be stopped by a muddy foot.
"I came all this way and what do I get? A shocked word and a shove out." Billy spat quietly, forcing the door open a couple inches. "It's been awhile."
"Yeah too long. I'm getting married you know."
"Pop wrote me just last month and told me. Never really wondered why you didn't write me yourself until now," Billy turned half hiding his features, but turned back with a magnificently goofy smile. "Hey let's go for a walk, Emmers."
"I really can't. I’ve got--"
"I bet you could. An old friend. A short evening stroll down the beach. Come on."
"No, really--"
"Emmers, I would love for a stroll before you run away and marry." Maybe it was the way he called her Emmers or the look of mildly-insane desperation, but she found herself locking the door behind her, as he led her onto the cool late afternoon sand. They trudged across sifting sand, as shells crunched underfoot reminding her of afternoons searching for limestone and coal when they were in Eight Grade. Billy promised to take her all over the world to search out precious rocks and gems, once he was a renowned Geologist.
A flash of sunlight broke the daydream. "How are your parents," she asked grasping snippets of thought into a forced conversation.
"Dunno, haven't seen them."
"What do you mean? Why haven't you seen them? How long's it been?"
Billy glanced nervously down toward his muddy shoes now covered lightly in sand. Ignoring the questions, he pulled a bedraggled cigar from his breast pocket where ornaments of valor usually hung. "Emmers, do you love him? I mean do you really love him. You see what I'm asking, Emmers?"
"Billy, I am confused. Why are you here?" Emmers answered ignoring his question and watching her shadow creep out to sea, as they headed down the beach with sand fleas nipping the tender skin between her toes. "Where you discharged honorably? Dishonorably," she asked hesitantly swallowing the lump in her throat.
"I believe they call it AWOL." Billy announced pronouncing AWOL with a thick southern accent, drawing out the O sound until Gulls answered him. Awooooooooolll!!!!
Emmers swiveled toward Billy suddenly only half-expecting that answer, but as she wiggled her lips to speak he splashed deeper into the ocean, dropping the cigar for blue crabs to snap at in the surf. She lifted her skirt following him deeper.
"Emmers, did you know just last quarter We, and when I say "We" you know I mean the U.S Military, stole up and down the Eastern Coast at least three dozen times." Billy swept his arm left to right and versa vice up and down the horizon. "They say it was technical maneuvers to determine if our Coastal Guard should be recognized as an integral part of the military or just some water-watchers from an old "Flipper" episode," Billy carried on, his tennis shoes slipping off and floating toward Ireland. He continued. "And speaking of Flipper! You know what I think?" He nudged Emmers lightly in the ribs of her semi-soaked floral print. "Those damn dolphins. That Flipper was the beginning. Just last month you know what we did, Emmers? Do you? Huh? Well Emmers, down there in Miami we followed a school of those damn fish-mammal things. For Christ’s sake, I don't know the difference. Who the hell cares? Anyway.... We followed ‘em toward an aquarium in Dos Elgio and guess what We found? " Billy turned toward her eyes bleary with salt and seawind. His hand gripped hers as if readying himself for the most important discovery in America, grandiose to that of Edison's carbon filament or edible gumstick wrappers. "Well Emmers. The admiral let us out on shore to get a chilidog, and while I was squatting on the commode I heard dolphin sounds from the next stall. Can you believe it? A dolphin in the can! Well turned out it was some kid, so I followed him out of curiosity. He headed back to the tanks and tossed a receiver into the pool with the dolphins and started squawking into a copper colored mic. I approached him," Billy narrated, imitating a stealthy canter, but more sluggishly since he was waist deep in the Atlantic. "--and you know what that boy did, Emmers? Well I'll tell ya. He hopped right into the pool and I thought he was a goner. The fish swarmed up around him carrying him toward the gate, then just like that in a huge swoop they launched out of the pool, carrying him over the gate, out into the ocean. Can you believe that?"
Emmers who hadn't gotten a word in edgewise for a good 9 3/4 minutes turned back toward the land, nodding in agreeable amazement. "Billy, what exactly does that have to do with the Coast Gua--"
"Well I'll tell you what," Billy stammered his eyes clear, almost translucent. She pulled him toward shore, as he mumbled on, "I think that the military was really making sure the dolphins don't try to come up on shore. Come up on land with their technology, and try to crush sleeping vacationers at night. You know they can walk now, Emmers?"
"Who Billy?" Emmers answered dreamily feeling the rush of dry sand on her pruned toes.
"The dolphins, Emmers! Haven't you been listening. After the kid was swept away I found his knapsack and a copy of "The Crying of Lot 49." Have you read that one Emmers?" Billy asked recalling their weeks of book discussion ranging from Camus to Salinger. "Anyway, doesn't matter. I picked up the little novel and began to read it. I got to a part about the kid, the dolphins, and Miami, and I knew that what I saw was straight out of that novel and that the whole thing was true."
Emmers leading him toward a patch of scrubgrass asked, "All what was true? I'm lost Billy, and I'm cold." In the past she learned to ignore his eccentricity, but something seemed different, although she ignored it too, enraptured as she was by his latest take.
"The whole book. The boy was living proof. The secret mail society. The Trystero. The muted horn. All of it!" He swept a gesture across the sky westward toward the tourist town. "But Emmers, the book, the takeover of America, and the fall of the U.S. Post Master has no importance now I know that I love you."
He said it so matter-of-factly that she twisted toward him knocking them both to the sand atop a large dune overlooking Billy's supposed dolphin empire. A muffled cry of wonderment escaped from her teeth, as she jerked toward Billy. He took another cigar from his breast pocket and lit it before answering, "Emmers, I got that letter and knew the U.S. Military could find someone else to fill with mind exploding material. I need to take you away from here, away from the coast, away from the submarines. Marry me, Emmers. I will be a better man than your finance can be, or for that matter than his mother can be. Love me and let me love you. I am through with chili-dogs and dolphin stalls."
Staring at Billy her mouth hung open, as if she was attempting to catch flies. Recalling earlier years when the two of them were inseparable, she blinked looking toward the sea."I am happy. I can't runoff. You were my best friend--," She stopped abruptly as she saw Billy's head slump forward asleep. The cigar dropped from his mouth onto the sand next to his saturated pant leg. She did not know how long she stared at the cigar ember, a beacon in the otherwise dark night sky, but when she blinked the ember had died down, blew off into the coastal breeze. Years of staring into his eyes, his tales, and spontaneity burned with curiosity in her throat, as Billy began to stir.
"Mmmmm. What a wonderful nap of peanut butter skies and apple butter roads," he mumbled rubbing the sandman from his eyes.
She vowed resting her salted hair in his lap, "Billy, I will marry you. I'll spend my days with you and your dolphin stories. We can hide from the submarines and teach the Coast Guards how to play Marco Polo. I love you, Billy."
"So do I Emmers. So do I". Billy unholstered his military issued handgun and fired two bullets into her and his skulls, respectively.

Copyright 1997