Revisiting

By Frank Limestone

To escape a break-up, Owen Fulwist, a reluctant twenty-two year old home theater salesman, moves to Illinois. Only days into his new life, Owen discovers what we can and cannot run from and ponders how anyone is able to handle the rest. Told through Owen's keen, often times naive perspective, Revisiting is a story of stumbling youth and destructive rumination.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Lulu.com
• Release date: Dec 28, 2017
• ISBN: 9781387475018

Book preview

Revisiting

Revisiting

A novel

This book is a work of fiction. All characters and events are a product of the author’s imagination. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

Cover Design by Julia Fitzsimons

Author Photograph by Samantha Fitzsimons

Copyright  2017 by Frank Limestone

ISBN  978-1-387-07801-1

For Manth, who gave me the only writing advice I needed:

Finish the book

Prologue

——————————

(about 5 months ago)

I took a hundred and fifty dollars out of my checking account in an effort to feel alive again. I smiled at the teller and took the crisp, chalky bills.

Remaining balance: $14.72. Oh well.

Nick was sitting in the parking lot, idling in his rusted Silverado. It felt good to be driving around with him again. I felt wild.

Today we were headed across the Pennsylvanian border to buy fireworks. We had a friend (more Nick’s than mine) that had a massive house, and tonight he was throwing a huge party for the Fourth of July. I had to be assured by Nick more than once that no one from high school would be there. 

One-fifty? He asked, pulling out of the bank. He was wearing cargo shorts and a wrinkled Gun’s-N-Rose’s shirt. His hair was never anything but a variation of a buzz cut. I noticed a new tattoo just above above his elbow. He had so many I barely noticed. It looked like a grenade.

Yeah. Is that too much?

That’s chump change! Haven’t you bought fireworks before?

Actually, no.

Well, shit. Here. He tossed a lump of cash bound in a rubber band at me.

Dude...? I started counting. Nick. This is seven hundred dollars.

"I may have sold a few things. We’re gonna have ourselves a good ass night."

I’ll say. So, who did you say is going again?

I don’t know. Probably a lot of Steve’s college friends. All I know is the place is gonna be packed with pussy.

Right.

Yeah man—Jesus Christ, is this asshole going to let me in?

Nick forced his way onto the thruway, engine screaming as everyone flew by in the little worlds of their own cars. The landscape opened up into farms and fields and the forgotten groupings of trees in between. I liked being in transit.

You excited? Nick asked.

For sure. I’ve never done this.

"I mean about the girls, man. I’m trying to get laid tonight. Although, yeah, I’m pretty stoked for the fireworks too."

I laughed.

You know I got your back right? I mean, I’m making sure everybody gets laid tonight.

"Well, alrighty bro. How long is it to the store?"

GPS says an hour and fifteen but it’s never right. You want one of these? Nick asked, pointing at two sweating energy drinks in the cup holders.

Hell yeah.

They were two for five at the gas station. Figured I’d pick one up for my boy.

Thanks!

I’m glad we’re hanging again, Owen. It’s been too long. We sort of drifted apart there for a while.

Relationships, man.

You said it. I’m so glad I’m not with Brittney anymore. Shit was not going good for a while. Better off friends, you know? It’s crazy. We both broke up around the same time. Now we’re both single and ready to party like old times. Hey what’s up with you and Abbey by the way? You two been talking at all?

I took the first sip of the energy drink, sharp and sweet. I listened to the engine ticking, the wheels humming…sun across corn fields. I wanna be the guy that puts the rumble strips in the road, I thought.

Owen?

No.

* * *

We showed up a little after nine and couldn’t find a spot in the driveway. Nick had to park in the weeds down the street. Steve’s house was the last on a dead-end road with only a field in sight behind it. It was hunter green, with giant arched windows. The house would be worth millions if it were in anywhere else but here.

We came in through the three-car garage and right away spotted Steve, looking through music on a phone hooked up to speakers.

Yo Stevie-G!

Nicholas! He cried, throwing his arms around Nick.  

Steve was one of those guys. The man. Commonly referred to as Stevie-G. He never completely fit within a clique but was known and loved by everyone in high school. Geeks loved him. Jocks loved him. He plays like six instruments, speaks French, and is good at every sport. He was always so charming, too. Eloquent. Comfortable everywhere. He could explain the rules of beer pong just as fluently as he could talk about genocide in Africa.

Owen Fulwist? My man! I heard you might be coming.

Stevie-G. Nice place dude! Thanks for the invite. I said, handshake-hugging him.

Thanks! Oh right! You’ve never been here before, have you? My parents built it in nineteen ninety-four? I think? I forget. Got the idea from some royal house in England. I always thought it was a little pompous, you know? But it’s great for parties! He said, hoisting a red solo cup. Everyone hollered and raised their own. It may as well have been a sword he was holding—the war-chief leading us into battle. With what? Our livers?

Definitely. I smiled.

We’re good, right? He asked. I thought he meant about the fireworks.

Yeah, I think we have enough.

We’ll unload everything in the back. Nick said.

Oh okay. I picked up some too. There’s a pile back there at the edge of the lawn, you’ll see it. Drinks are inside and there’s food sort of all around. Help yourself.

We walked back to the truck and grabbed the shopping bags full of fireworks and weaved through the crowd in the backyard, fielding comments from everyone asking if there was pot in the bags. Nick wanted to hide the bags in the high grass so nobody messed with them.

We ended up on the back deck where a group was playing poker. Nick filled two cups with bad beer from the keg that we sipped on, leaned up against the railing. Once the terror set in, we both pulled out our phones.

Neither of us knew anyone.

To our left was an in-ground pool full of glistening bodies, shrieks of joy, a guy and a girl getting increasingly technical with their jumps. On the swing set, a pack of buzzed broskis collided at the end of the slide. Probably hadn’t been used since Steve was a kid. Three tables were set up in the yard for beer pong. People sat in lawn chairs around a stone fire pit, watching the games, having intimate conversations.

I felt sick. I didn’t want to be here amongst the living. All these smiling faces, people yelling and slapping each other on the back. Then the huddling together for a photo, everyone in some pose that will portray them as someone you’d want to be around. The focused silence after when they all look down send the photos out and into the hands of others. Am I alive world?

See any potential? Nick asked.

Hmm? Oh. I looked around to humor him.

Through the sliding glass door, I saw a full bar complete with a bartender making drinks for everyone in the living room. The stale, severed heads of random animals watched everything from high above a fireplace. People were standing around the bar and sitting on couches, picking at appetizers on the coffee table.

"Of course he has a bar and of course there’s actually a bartender." I said.

Right?

Then I saw the kitchen through another window—the chandelier, people playing flip cup on granite countertops. I recognized a face, but I couldn’t be sure.

Where you going? Nick asked.

I walked through the sliding glass door. I wondered if I should take my shoes off, no one else had.

She was leaned up against the counter, talking to someone I didn’t recognize, holding a glass of white wine. I stopped for a minute to make sure. Her hair was darker, almost jet black now. She had on a Boy Scout uniform as a top. I was dumbfounded for some reason. As if any part of that life couldn’t blend into this one.

Cassidy?

I caught her reaction before she had time to be polite and change it. Fear. Dread. Horror. God no.

Owen. Hi. What brings you here?

I’m here with Nick. I pointed out the window. How…how are you?

Her eyes took me back to the time we all went camping. Her hair then wasn’t much longer than a buzz cut. We all saw her peeing in the woods when she didn’t get far enough away from camp.

I’ve been good. She said, looking around. Same old. How are you?

I’m good. How’s umm—

Nope. She closed her eyes. It didn’t seem like she was on her first drink.

"Nope. I know what you wanna ask. I’m not getting into it, Owen. You want to know how she is, you call her. Or better yet, don’t call her. Now if you’ll excuse me I was in the middle of a conversation."

Right. Well, have a good night.

Yeah. Peace out girl scout.

I walked back into the living room and ordered two shots of whiskey.

Where’d you go? What is that? Nick asked when I came back onto the deck.

Shut the fuck up and drink it. Hey! I shouted at the closest beer pong table. Everyone looked up and my heart skipped a beat. We got next!

* * *

Dude, I think she’s into you. Nick said.

"No way. I saw her checking you out."

Seriously? He said, and then looked over at the blonde sitting at the fire pit. She was staring at her phone now.

Stevie-G walked out onto the lawn with a glowing tray of jello shots. He handed one to everyone and told us to hold them up. Just beyond Stevie-G’s arm, I saw Cassidy leaving with a couple other girls. I was a couple beers, a couple shots in now.

Look at me. Turn around and look at me.

Cheers to… Steve started.

Escape. I said underneath someone shouting: AMERICA!

* * *

Streaks of red and green and blue. The stink of sulfur all around. They were cheering now. They adored us. Nick and I were the only ones lighting off the fireworks. High-fives all around.

I lit a long one (one of those big cubes with multiple shots) and fell back in the grass and watched it go off. I thought about the year 1776 and what they were doing then. What they might have wished we’d be doing two hundred something years later.

Owen! Bro! Give me the lighter! Nick yelled.

* * *

It occurred to me—once a majority of people left and my head felt heavy on the back of a wicker porch chair—that I drank too much.

Everything was quieting down. Those still here were on the porch smoking cigarettes and talking. Then I remember Nick slapping me in the face and us play-fighting on the lawn. Then we were going down to the basement. I fell and slid down the stairs on my hip.

Of course the basement was pimped out. The recessed lighting was so bright you forgot you were underground. A sectional leather couch sat in front of a…I’d say 42" flat screen. The pool table was on a sort of platform and behind that was another bar smaller than the one upstairs but still decent size. Two bars in one house. I could make a guess as to where Steve’s parents were tonight.

But, where was I? Drunk as well.

Shit. I said.

This is it. Stevie-G said with open arms.

I feel lachrymose.

What?

Nothing. Damn Stevie-G! I would just live down here. I said as everyone headed toward a room in the corner.

I pretty much do. Yo, if you’re smoking we gotta do it in the bathroom over here. I must have looked confused or scared because he put a hand on my shoulder. Just weed. Don’t have to if you don’t want to.

He was so well put together. I wondered if he ever fell apart.

Nah. I’m down. 

Eight of us fit just fine in the oversized bathroom. I knew no one besides Nick and Stevie-G. The girl Nick was flirting with earlier was down here with us too. 

We passed around a glass pipe with slivers of red and yellow and green inside it