Father Bestseller and Stupid Hat

by Ryan Robert Mullen

Man, the Sun was strung up in them trees just like a bunch of Christmas lights, but it was warm and green and breathing real even. Bugs crawled on our skin and poked their legs into us, but we didn't care because we were going to have a baby.

And I had this coupon for a free taco at Taco John's, and she could get free fries at one of those upscale hot dog joints. She was so hungry. And Man, my face was all hot and wet, but I wasn't even embarrassed, and it must've looked like some kinda terrible accident had occurred. It was just that we didn't really mean to have a baby and to be living in her car.

But we didn't do heroin, even though I must've looked it when I went to get her a refill on the water. We didn't do much of anything except collect piles and piles of job applications. There was a time we actually filled them out, and would stop back and stop back, and the manager would never be in, and they'd say they'd call us. Hell, no address and certainly no phone: I wouldn't hire us either. But'd we'd get up real early, and the windows would be all cool and misted, and we'd get our free bread and donuts, and wash our faces in the lake, and count ourselves fortunate no police or sickos disturbed our tumultuous slumber. We'd have a whole day of work ahead, many applications to tuck away.

The problem with homelessness is the temperature. Finally we got to talk about how maybe I should go to the shelter, and maybe she should go stay at mother's. Mother's is not my mother, not a home for both of us, not a place I can go and put my feet up and say I got your daughter pregnant and don't have no job. So maybe we are out here because I'm selfish. I said, Baby I have five dollars for food, please lets get something, but she threw up every morning because she was so hungry she had no appetite.

The day we found out we lay in this green and sunny place, and I said you want to keep it don't you.

The stethoscope is just a mechanical extension of the ear, and all you really need to do is stick it against her bellybutton, and you will know the thing moves constantly, and a sadness like black cherries will unfurl like an old prostitute's sunken breasts. It will appear in your throat and make you turn.

Turn my body away from her body, and feel her sweat-sticky ass against my back, and night vision churns away against the room and that stupid hat. Ol’ good Sally got this thin but real shiny blonde hair like small fish. Oh, she really is pretty but rarely wears barrettes. I have seen pictures of her, a little girl. She now has to work at Rocky Rococo's Pizza, and has to wear this red shirt and stupid hat. This stupid hat is in our home. I see it. I kick it beneath a lime green towel. The stupid hat blames me.

Man that kid makes me think money & money. And shit, then the neighbors start screaming fuck you, and I’m awake, but she--she just sleeps right through like some Yankee Clipper, but not me. I’m getting all sensitive and weepy about this little baby, and how, man, I never thought in a million years, but now I gotta take care of this little guy. Shit, I used to party. Used to be in school too and on the Dean's List and well on my way. Used to be idealistic. Idealism is buying generic shit. So the baby makes me think about money because the food will affect its brain. It's good to go out to eat even if it's something cheap. My girlfriend is real pretty and faithful too, but I pray my baby is not a girl. Because boys can take it.

Before this baby I didn't think too much. You don't have to worry about no collectors tossing your ass in the can and no credit to maintain. I'm worried now. And my forehead is all folded up, and my eyes busted-in. This baby will have summer days with pine sap in it's fingernails, reeking of mosquito repellent and campfire. Poor kids have to be awfully tough, or else. I remember Christmas, the year I got golf clubs for my birthday, and how I ran up to my room because I had never even uttered golf before, and I am sorry mom and dad, because now I understand that present must've cost you an awful lot.

And work is real! I mean, you can't just go drinking and smoking that shit away, not when you've got some gal with a baby in her, not when you're a grown man with real balls. Man, did I smoke away some real good money. Man, did I go out in the cold and have all my bottles crash through the brown paper, but what else could you use it for? Rent. The good thing about apartments is right before the electricity gets cut, you move.

There will be pictures of this baby, and it will have a cute periwinkle bonnet, and look like such a doll, and have a toy to remember forever and ever. In the future the rich will get so old they can barely speak, but what will they do to my baby when I've left home and they can still get it up chemically. If this kid’s a boy, if this kid doesn't have enough money he might not marry a pretty girl. Just don't want my baby to be prescribed MAOI inhibitors and not have good insurance. I messed up, and there wasn’t the Second Coming, and everything kept going.

My baby will come and make of things what it will.  We can hope for minimum expectations exceeded and long, green, sunny vacations with mother painter and father bestseller. I will make you an exquisite house for catching insects and bugs.

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Ryan Robert Mullen has been published in over forty print magazines and electronic journals. His short story collection Naughty Sweet Boy was published by Word Riot Press in Winter 2004.

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