the dead man - 4. the wanderer

by nick nelson

part four of 31

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when lucas grew a little older, he learned to walk, and he roamed the earth as free as gilgamesh, or buddha, or robin hood. lily mae usually slept late - until noon at least. lucas would get up, and feed himself. usually on yahoo chocolate drink, and crackers. saltines or ritz crackers or graham crackers. he did not think of this as “breakfast”, or have any word for it. then he would go outdoors and set out on his travels. the town lily mae and lucas lived in was not subject to violent winters, although it did rain a lot. nor did it ever get ferociously hot, except perhaps once every two or three years. so lucas, in his days of freedom, always went out “rain or shine”. of course, in the great scheme of things, his days of freedom did not last that long. but perhaps we are getting ahead of ourselves. lucas’s first day of freedom was a bright day in may. the clouds which never completely left the sky were higher than usual and the tops of the mountains, which the clouds usually obscured, were outlined clearly against the blue sky. but lucas was not interested in the sky, or the mountains. his eyes were on the ground. the first creature he encountered was a beetle wandering in the grass in the tiny patch of “yard” outside the house. he watched the beetle for fifty-four minutes, until it finally wandered out of the “yard” and on to the sidewalk. lucas carried on a conversation - mostly a monologue on his part - with the beetle, in a language he remembered from one of his millions of past lives. the beetle occasionally replied, but in a short concide manner, simply answering the questions lucas put to it. the beetle was the first friend lucas ever had, but he never even knew his name. * old mrs johnson looked down on lucas from her second floor porch. the little house lily mae and lucas lived in had two floors. luly mae and lucas lived on the first floor and mrs johnson and her sister miss miller lived on the second floor. mrs johnson took an interest in lucas’s and lily mae’s existence. miss miller did not. after watching lucas watch the beetle for about twenty minutes - during which time mrs johnson did not realize lucas was talking to the beetle - mrs johnson went inside and reported what she had seen to miss miller, but miss miller did not express any interest in what mrs johnson had seen. neither mrs johnson nor miss miller remembered talking to bugs or birds in their early years. but mrs johnson enjoyed leaning over the rail and watching lucas and began doing so on a regular basis. much as she had, as a child, enjoyed sitting beside the river and watching it flow. next